Subtlety is not DJ Khaled’s forte. The Miami collaboration connector recently finished his new album, Khaled Khaled, and to let the world know, he took out a massive billboard in downtown Miami announcing “Album 100% Done” and revealing the release date: April 30. He has not revealed the tracklist as yet, teasing the reveal in a social media post. The cover art, which Khaled also shared on his active Instagram account, features Khaled kneeling on a prayer rug in a lush, green garden, flanked by his sons wearing matching outfits.
DJ Khaled released his last album, Father of Asahd, in 2019, netting a Grammy nomination for the album’s Nipsey Hussle collaboration “Higher,” recorded just before Nipsey’s death in March of that year. The project also featured the hit “No Brainer” featuring Justin Bieber, Chance the Rapper, and Quavo, the Jay-Z and Beyonce collaboration “Top Off,” which also included Future, and the Outkast-sampling “Just Us” with SZA. Despite having so much star power, though, the album debuted at No. 2 behind Tyler The Creator’s Igor, prompting Khaled to express disapproval at Billboard‘s counting standards after bundle sales of his album were disallowed. A video of Khaled addressing criticisms of his commercial sound went viral when fans attributed it as an attack on Tyler, to which Tyler gave a cheeky reply on Twitter. Meanwhile, some attributed the disappointing result to Khaled’s jumbled rollout, in which many of the album’s singles were released on the same day — after the album itself had actually dropped.
Here’s hoping his next effort receives results more to Khaled’s liking — sure, it’s funny to think of him secretly being a sourpuss over essentially meaningless sales benchmarks, but personally I like the motivational speaker/ultra-positive version of Khaled because the world’s enough of a bitter mess as it is.
Khaled Khaled is due 4/30 via Epic Records. Stay tuned.
