Future: Purple Reign [EPIC]

Why you'll love it

This is Purple Reign's first time on vinyl, using the 2020 streaming tracklist with "News or Something" as the closer. Metro Boomin, Southside, Zaytoven and DJ Spinz handle the beats, with DJ Esco and Metro Boomin as executive producers.

This edition

• Stereo mix

About the album

Future had an enormous 2015, putting out Beast Mode, 56 Nights, DS2 and What a Time to Be Alive with Drake. Then, on January 17, 2016, he dropped Purple Reign on DatPiff and LiveMixtapes with eleven hours' notice, its title and lettering a tip of the cap to Prince.

The mood is cooler and more restrained than DS2, with Future sounding stoic over muted, monochrome production from Metro Boomin, Southside, Zaytoven, DJ Spinz and Nard & B. "Never Forget" is one of his most personal moments, "All Right" and "Salute" glide, "Run Up" and "No Charge" hit hard, and the title track sinks into a woozy, late-night haze. Spin's Matthew Ramirez heard Future holding back here, and that restraint is exactly what makes it hit. "Bye Bye" and "Drippin (How U Luv That)" round out a tape with no wasted moves.

In 2020 it finally arrived on streaming services, slightly reshuffled, and now it has a sleeve to go with it. For a record dropped with less warning than most of us get for a dentist appointment, it has aged remarkably well.

Also at Kops: more Future on vinyl · browse Hip Hop / R&B

Tracklist

Listen

On Freebandz / Epic (cat# 19658807251), a reissue of the 2016 album.