I’m sitting in a coffee shop because that’s where hip, mysterious writers practice their craft.
I haven’t made a purchase, but I feel like the tradeoff is fine because they’re subjecting me to an adult contemporary Spotify channel that is hypnotically compelling me to grow a handlebar mustache.
We’ll have none of that.
An Artist in M’ Craw
I had every intention to write about Alvvays, a band whose entire catalog I own on vinyl. They’re great, and I’ll get to them eventually, but I have an artist stuck in my craw, and I’m trying to make sense of my fascination with him.
His name is Yuno Miles, a mysterious, masked meme rapper who has made a name for himself by being truly, hilariously awful. On YouTube, he’s sometimes called the worst rapper alive. While this may or may not be true, he’s at least trying to get his name on the list.
If you aren’t familiar with Yuno Miles, I’m not sure where to tell you to start. His first YouTube video upload from 2019 is a song called Pokémon, a free-association screed over video game blips, tubular bells and a trap beat. Here’s a sample of his lyrics…
This ain't Pokémon but I feel like Ash Ketchum/ He lookin' for the Dragon Balls, but he won't even find 'em/ Yo' girl's so ugly I dodged her like The Matrix/ Got my ass beat by a n***a doin' The Matrix/ I just stowed away on an alien spaceship/ I threw away the sandwich cuz it had Mayonnaise on it!/ Hit him in the head with a bottle of mustard/ then he came back and hit me wit a bottle of ketchup...
Truthfully, this is one of his more coherent songs. The song that brought him to my attention (and now boasts 2.8 million views) is “Payday (ft. Yuno Marr),” where he begins to cement his wacky flow — hitting a vibrato-laden high note at the end of every phrase, as does Yuno Marr, who is almost unintelligible. Because my description could NEVER do it justice, I’m including the song here.
The reception to this song is fairly consistent, demonstrated by comments which are vicious and hilarious…
“YOU HAVE A HIDDEN TALENT. KEEP IT HIDDEN.”
“WHOEVER TOLD YOU TO DROP THIS TELL THEM TO PICK IT BACK UP!”
“TALENT CHASES HIM, BUT HE RUNS FASTER”
Wherein This Article Gets Existential…
Obviously, this is not “good” music in the sense that it would be played in the club or in your car or at a party — at least not ironically. And if it’s not “good,” then what value does it have? Is it art? Should we dismiss the music and its creator?
I’m a big fan of the show “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.” It’s a show where Jerry Seinfeld picks up a comedian in an outrageous car and they talk about comedy for 20 minutes or so. Oftentimes, the conversations are anecdotes about famous people, other comedians, bad stand-up gigs or simple comical observations, but every once in a while the conversations take a philosophical turn.
In the episode with Will Ferrell, the discussion turns to our current subject. Ferrell says, “I always feel very strange when someone refers to what we do as art.”
Seinfeld, in his typical ranting tone, responds, “Anything you make out of thin air that someone else likes is art.”
Jerry’s definition of art is a far cry from Plato, who developed the idea of art as “mimesis,” a Greek word that means “copying” or “imitation.” According to this definition, the greatest art was that art that accurately depicted or represented something beautiful, meaningful or powerful.
I’m not going to break down the history of art in this rambling epistle, but if you’ve laid eyes on an Andy Warhol print or a Jackson Pollock painting — or Rothko or Picasso or Koons or Marcel Duchamp’s toilet, you know Plato’s definition doesn’t work anymore.
And because I’ve seen these works, I tend to agree with Seinfeld. I think his definition is just as good as the one attempted (with thousands more words) by Encyclopedia Britannica, which basically says art is a “human-made thing, an artifact, as distinguished from an object in nature.” This is why Andres Serrano can pee in a glass, stick a crucifix in it and call it art.
So, with that in mind, let’s turn back to our subject.
Does Yuno Miles “have bars?” I guess we have to ask what that means. Are his bars dumb? Yes! Is his flow lame? Yes! Does he make me laugh? Yes! Is he entertaining? Absolutely! If Miles’ bars consistently make me laugh out loud, I would say, “Yes, he does indeed have bars.”
But the greatest thing about Miles is that he’s in on the joke. He knows exactly what he’s making and why he’s making it. In his videos, he’s always holding money, no matter the song. Sometimes it’s a wad of 20’s. More often, it’s maybe $10 in ones. He wanders around playgrounds and parking lots, randomly sitting or standing or awkwardly lying on tables. His flow is preposterous. He drifts off key. He drifts off beat. He randomly yells or makes stupid noises.
Fantano Gets the Skinny
This week, I had the good fortune to catch “the internet’s busiest music nerd,” Anthony Fantano, interview Yuno Miles (included below if you missed it). I found Miles to be candid, smart, funny and fully aware of how and why he’s achieved his notoriety.
When asked about his equipment, Miles said, “It’s a 15-dollar mic and a hundred-dollar computer.” He records his songs in the basement because he was kicked out of the living spaces in his house — “I mean, the ceiling’s kind of MISSIN’!” When asked why his grandma catches so many strays in his lyrics, he said, “I think she deserves it.”
My favorite moment in the interview, however, is when Fantano asks, “Maybe this is the opposite of what you would ask most artists, but could you see yourself making worse music in the future?”
Miles immediately answers, “Of course, man! Like I’m always trying to get worse….”
The Point de Resistance
I don’t want to pretend I have the supreme taste in music or that I don’t gravitate to the songs of my Gen-X youth, but I am a seeker. I’m always looking for artists that are trying to make something new.
100 Gecs created a blippy, grungy, danceable, lunatic genre called “hyperpop” and honestly blew me away with the craft of their second album, “10,000 Gecs.” L’il Yachty was barely on my radar outside of his sometimes hilarious interviews, but I found “Let’s Start Here” a seismic album that unfortunately didn’t convince the critics that an artist was at work. (I have lots of opinions about this particular snub, but I’ll keep them to myself for this particular article.)
I found Wednesday’s “Rat Saw God” exhilarating. I found Mandy, Indiana’s industrial-electro-pop-art nightmare, “i’ve seen a way,” brash and confident, the production of a great talent. Fontaines DC and Viagra Boys are redefining punk rock in creative ways, and Black MIDI wants to reduce it to rubble and rebuild it in their image.
I love these artists. We need these artists.
But where does young Yuno Miles fit? I would never argue that he is attempting to “push” hip-hop or innovate in any interesting way. He’s not challenging stereotypes as much as he is parodying them. You could compare him to Weird Al Yankovic in that way, but he’s not as interested musical chops, polish or wit in his creations.
He wants to act up, offend ears and make people laugh. He’s not concerned with who likes him, who doesn’t or who is indifferent. He’s just making music and throwing it at the wall to see what sticks. In a word, he’s making slapstick rap.
I’m not here to critique Yuno Miles or dissect him or ponder his place in musical culture. I’m just here to celebrate him.
There are such great gobs of bland songs in the world today. Artists who take themselves too seriously, artists who are desperate to portray themselves as something they are not, artists who pose and preen and seduce and posture.
And then there are artists who just do what they want. They make themselves laugh, make their friends laugh and see just how far they can take the joke.
I celebrate Yuno Miles because he reminds me of how fun it is to make things in your room (or basement), and how consequential it is to bring sheer delight to millions of people you’ll never meet.
He could’ve quit the first time he read a comment that said, “You are WHACK,” but he didn’t. And we’re all better for it.