On December 7, 2018, rapper XXXTENTACION released his third studio album, Skins. Skins is a rap album with a sole feature from Kanye West on it. XXXTENTACION is most popular among teenage audiences, as well as young adults. A few of the songs that brought XXXTENTACION to stardom are Jocelyn Flores, LOOK AT ME!, and SAD! to name a few.

Six months prior to the release of this album, XXXTENTACION was violently shot in his car while in Miami for a charity event. Due to the circumstances, there are only ten tracks on the album.

The better tracks on the album were “Guardian angel” and “BAD!”. “Guardian angel” was interesting because at the start of the song, it plays one of his previous songs, “Jocelyn Flores”, in reverse. That attribute was cool because it made the song likeable from the very start of it. This song showed emotion because it reflected on the pain he may have caused his past girlfriends, and how that has started to affect him.

“BAD!” was released prior to the release of the album and the death of the rapper. The song blew up instantly as XXXTENTACION’s fans were eager for more music from him. The song has a catchy chorus, but that chorus is almost all there is to the song. Throughout the 1:34 the song lasts, the rapper repeats the chorus four times. The song has a good beat to it, which really makes it worth listening to.

Some of the weaker tracks on the album are “STARING AT THE SKY” and “what are you so afraid of”. “STARING AT THE SKY” was purely just XXXTENTACION screaming into the microphone, which was not a very pleasant sound. The background music in that song was very overpowering, so it gave the vibe that it was having a yelling competition with the vocals. There are not many words in the song at all, and the words that are in it are repetitive and somewhat meaningless. This track did not match the tone of the rest of the album whatsoever.

“what are you so afraid of” does not flow with the tone of the album either, but for the exact opposite reason. The song is very mellow and it sounds almost as if it is a lullabye. The lyrics to it however, are the same things repeated twice and that is it.

All in all, the album was okay. It was not quite what you would expect after two very good albums he produced, but his management produced what they could considering the content they had prior to the singer’s murder. This is definitely XXXTENTACION’s worst album released, but they worked with all that they had, which is respectable.