Over 10 years ago, Earl Sweatshirt made music from an extremely dark place. His 2015 album I Don’t Like S**t, I Don’t Go Outside was extremely stark and lyrically dense, digging deep into paranoia and depression.
“I was f***ed up when I made ‘Grief’,” he told Pitchfork in 2015. “I had been prescribed to be inside because I had f***ing medical exhaustion, so I was asleep for, like, three weeks and then I f***ing went outside and tore my meniscus and limped around on that for two weeks. My leg atrophied. It got hella small, along with my self-esteem. I wasn’t taking any pain pills or nothing, but then I took a Vicodin and went home and that song all just happened at once… The way that “Grief” felt and how everything settled really captured 100% where I was at. Everything I wanted to say to the world and the n***as that was close to me and s**t.”
So, where do you pick up inspiration on a record so disturbed? Some rap fans might assume Earl Sweatshirt and his style come from a place of hip-hop traditionalism that certain hip-hop fans hold onto closely. However, it’s actually Future that informed quite a bit of his musical instincts around that time.
Earl Sweatshirt Cites Future as a Big Inspiration When Making This Dark 2015 Classic
“Bro, it took me a second, but Future is going so crazy right now,” he said. “The 56 Nights s**t is cool, but you can still f**k with Monster and Beast Mode because this n***a’s one-liners is the craziest s**t ever. He just randomly sneaks in such things that be having me stuck. This man said, ‘I don’t know what type of love is this.’ I f***ing feel you, dawg! I f**k with Future because Future f**ks with Future so heavy right now. He’s really all the way in it.”
Earl Sweatshirt has been on record for years talking about how much he loves Future’s music. Back in 2015, he was adamant about securing a verse from the Atlanta legend on his own projects. In 2021, he tweeted, “Future say s**t like ‘your racks will neva b honorable’ i really f**k wit dude music alot.”
Then, in 2024, he cited a Future classic and a Wu-Tang Clan deep cut as extremely inspirational at one point. “Only listening to the songs ‘black shampoo’ by U-God and ‘codeine crazy’ by future around 20-30 times each today please respect my privacy,” Earl Sweatshirt wrote at the time.
The post Earl Sweatshirt Reveals One of the Big Inspirations Behind His Dark 2015 Album ‘I Don’t Like S**t, I Don’t Go Outside’ appeared first on VICE.
