20+ Features on ‘Featuring Ty Dolla $ign’

There is no doubt that Ty Dolla $ign is as talented as they come. No matter what hat he’s wearing — producer, vocalist, or collaborator — Ty’s artistic genius shines. In his album “Featuring Ty Dolla Sign,” he furthers that impressive range and calls attention to a slew of impressive collaborations, enhancing each track with signature vocal backings catered to its featured artist. Unfortunately, in the process of adapting to other artists’ energies, his own sound takes the backseat and his lyrical genius is given little space to shine.

It’s a shame, because the project as a whole is a clear attempt by Ty to take his sound to the next level and evolve beyond the same mainstream concepts. The busyness of the 25 tracks and the influence of various featured artists, however, overwhelm that agenda.

Perhaps counterintuitively, the album’s first two songs contain no features. “Intro” and “Status” take the leap into a more self-reflective vibe, introducing an essential theme of this album: “It's time to wake they ass up” to Ty. This sets up the angle that the music industry needs Ty, not the other way around. That motif carries over to solo tracks like “Return” and “serpentwithfeet Interlude,” which grapple with great expectations and preach a renewed sense of purpose, emphasized by the serenading spirituality of the vocals. Whether it’s due to Ty’s own aspirations or the words of Kanye West urging him “Dolla, you too good to put your voice on that generic shit,” the message remains clear — whether it’s a music project or a whole career, have the confidence to take things to the next level.

There are few tracks which reach that objective. R&B jams like “Lift Me Up,” “Your Turn,” and “By Yourself” are the rare examples on this record where Ty’s voice is center stage, and the artists around him create a balanced harmony that complements his sound: guitar riffs guided by gentle 808’s accompany the classic Ty flow brimming with runs, vocalizations, and harmonies. Serving to elevate his sound, these hidden gems are scattered few and far between.

This vibe comes into conflict with another common theme of the album: trying to appeal to many audiences.

Many different sounds and flows take the spotlight in the party bop side of this record. Hype beats and fast tempos dominate tracks like “Spicy,” where Ty accommodates the rock mellow vibes of Post Malone to recreate something reminiscent of their previous collaboration, “Psycho.” It comes as a shock to no one that “Track 6” and “Tyrone 2021” also went straight into the mainstream, since they are heavily swayed to the singular vibes of icons like Anderson .Paak and Big Sean. The club-type bangers “Ego Death” and “Expensive” quickly rose to fame as well, once again heavily influenced by the individualistic styles of artists like Kanye West and Nicki Minaj. Although it garners Ty some instant hits, these tracks create a push and pull in different directions, mixing various sounds past the point of no semblance of commonality.

The fast track to fame has another downside; it comes at the price of downplaying Ty’s sound, which makes these tracks incongruous with the apparent objective of this work.

Not only does the rapper’s voice get lost in the process of stretching himself too thin to appeal to different genres, but the busyness of the album stems from that problem as well. The soulfulness of “Temptations” clashes with the saccharine romanticism of “Universe” and has no connection to the striking social commentary in “Real Life.” Together, they have no connection to the album’s larger message. While it is impressive to see such a diversity of sound jammed into one record, it is not executed cohesively enough to be considered part of a larger thematic work.

While there is not a whole lot of time invested in establishing a correspondence throughout the album, it is far from being a failure. “Featuring Ty Dolla Sign” did not break away from the mainstream, but neither did it miss the mark. The transitions between tracks exemplify Ty’s top-tier production, and the household names help to propel it straight to chart-topping success. Regardless of its route to success, the lengthy album has a handful of songs worth revisiting: party-starters guaranteed to make it to every self-respecting DJ’s booth.