No more waiting. No more refreshing Spotify. You’re not dreaming. Music is finally here.

Music took about four and a half years to materialize, and Playboi Carti matches the long wait with his longest, most wide-ranging album—a nearly 77-minute record that boasts blockbuster features and makes official several fan-favorite snippets. Where Whole Lotta Red felt focused in its brazen, punk-imbued approach, Music sprawls with classic Atlanta rap, industrial synths, and electropop.

Here are five takeaways from the album:

But Wait, There’s More Waiting

Leave it to this guy to be fashionably late to an album release he first announced years ago. When the clock struck midnight on the East Coast last night, we didn’t get Music; we got a rare X post from Carti with some of the guests on the album and a promise that the project would arrive at midnight Pacific Time. So Carti spent the wee hours of the night posting FaceTime screenshots with some of the featured artists, like Skepta, Young Thug, and Lil Uzi Vert. And, naturally, midnight Pacific came and went, and fans began to freak out over another botched album release. While Kai Cenat streamed overnight, Carti used him as a liaison to give updates on the album. “ANY MIN NOW,” reads a text from him to Kai near 4 AM, “IF IT WASN’T FOR THE SAMPLES AND CLEARANCES IT WOULD BEEN OUT AT 12 EAST.” It wasn’t until around 7:30 a.m. Eastern that Music finally surfaced across digital streaming platforms. The album was posted in such a frenzy that writers and producers are still yet to be credited on DSPs. As goofy as it sounds, it shouldn’t come as a surprise.

Paying Homage

If there’s one thing Playboi Carti has been clear about, with regard to Music, it’s that he’s using this record to channel his influences. His native roots in Atlanta are on display all across the board: His vocal cadence on several tracks, like “Walk” and “Toxic,” feels directly adapted from Future; and DJ Swamp Izzo, whose voice bellows throughout the album, has longstanding ties with Young Thug, Gucci Mane, and countless other local stars; there even appears to be a sample of Rich Kidz’s “Bend Over” on “Like Weezy.” With that being said, it’s arguably Lil Wayne whose influence permeates the album the most. For starters, there’s the title, as the New Orleans rap legend has notably had “I Am Music” tattooed on his forehead since his prime. And, recently, there was an image floating around from an old WorldStar video of Wayne wearing a boxing robe with the same phrase written on it in red. The horns and key shifts of Carti’s “Radar” may be heavily indebted to the sound Lex Luger brought to Atlanta, but they also sound like something Wayne would’ve rapped on in 2011.

Deadbeat Label Head

Playboi Carti opened the floodgates of a new generation in rap with his own imprint, Opium, kickstarted by the release of Whole Lotta Red in 2020. Since then, his signees Ken Carson and Destroy Lonely, (and Homixide Gang, too, I guess) have released droves of music and cultivated swarming fanbases. Yet, somehow, Playboi Carti never releases music with any of them. Even Music, a sprawling epic that features guest vocals on nearly half of its 30 songs, doesn’t find space for the artists under his wing. Instead, he reunites with plenty of familiar faces: Travis Scott, Future, Skepta, Young Thug, and the Weeknd, all past collaborators, each contribute at least once on the record. Most surprisingly, Kendrick Lamar appears three times on Music, acting as hypeman on “Mojo Jojo” before dropping off scathing verses on “Backd00r” and “Good Credit.” Dot’s uncanny laughter on the latter track is something out of a horror flick.

The Return of 16*29

If you were there when Playboi Carti and Lil Uzi Vert dropped their first-ever collab, “Left Right,” in 2015, you may be eligible for senior health benefits. This release, and the short-lived Left Right Tour from 2016, marked the start of a bromance for the two self-proclaimed rockstars. They’ve dropped several tracks together and spent years teasing a joint-album, 16*29, before leaks and diverging life paths prevented it from properly materializing. For a while, it seemed like they wouldn’t collaborate again. Thankfully, Uzi and Carti have finally linked again on Music, joining forces on “Jumpin.” It’s a far cry from the bubbly effervescence of “Lookin” and “Wokeuplikethis*.” Here, they’re instead intoning from the bottom of their throats, tweaking off drugs in dark rooms. On the flip side, “Twin Trim” gives Uzi the space for a solo interlude, lilting over twinkling horns and smiley synths to bring back the shiny gleam of the old days.

TikTok Edit Music?

So, some of the singles from Carti’s storied 2024 run actually end up on Music, but they’re a bit different now. “Ketamine,” from last March, has been renamed to “K Pop” (that’s easier to market, right?); and the title of “H00dByAir” has been condensed to just “HBA,” with some key lines that are notably left out. The most striking change, though, comes with “Evil J0rdan,” which has been reworked to have an entire instrumental intro tacked on. It’s extremely melodramatic, complete with wispy, muted vocals and guitar-driven ambience that appeared at live performances at festivals like Camp Flog Gnaw and Summer Smash last year. The live version’s abrasive, stuttering beat drop has had dedicated online fans in a headlock, resulting in a viral TikTok sound from a fan remake. It’s the first time Carti has adapted a live rendition of his music for a studio release, an act of fan service that surely has some kids geeking in high school chemistry right about now.