{"id":696713,"date":"2026-05-27T08:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T08:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/696713\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T08:12:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T08:12:08","slug":"fakemink-terrified-album-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/696713\/","title":{"rendered":"fakemink: Terrified . Album Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cDying isn\u2019t in the plans,\u201d Drake<\/a> rapped<\/a> in 2011, and the flex that followed could also have been a complaint: \u201cBut neither was making it, and here I am.\u201d That line comes to mind when I think of fakemink<\/a>, a begrudging superstar who learned his snare patterns<\/a> from \u201cHeadlines<\/a>,\u201d then wasted little time making headlines of his own. He has called himself<\/a> the \u201cEminem of the UK underground,\u201d and his raps are transatlantic and cartoonish: nasally, high-pitched fever dreams, melding the debauched swagger of DJ Escrow<\/a> with the melodic pop instincts of Drizzy. Though his debut mixtape, the sparse London\u2019s Saviour (2023), seemed boastfully titled, the songs themselves were brooding\u2014among them, the slick \u201cJust Kitten,\u201d whose most memorable line is no longer true: \u201cYou think I\u2019m underground,\u201d Mink rapped. \u201cI\u2019m far below.\u201d Three years and over 100 loosies later, he has ascended into the rarefied embrace of runway cameos<\/a>, A-list<\/a> co-signs<\/a>, and your cousin\u2019s For You page. Fakemink is very famous, and he would like to assure us that he is thinking very deeply about it.<\/p>\n

But how is he feeling? How is he changing? We still don\u2019t know by the end of Terrified ., his supposedly confessional debut studio album. Tension, not resolution, has long been the marrow of his music, which juxtaposes not only sounds\u2014bloghouse, cloud rap, indie rock, electroclash\u2014but sensibilities: haughtiness and humility, wrestling but never quite resolving, like Beyblades cursed to spin forever. The Fakemink of Terrified . is a conflicted anti-hero; oftentimes, like on the raucous \u201cRewind,\u201d his layered vocals embody his several selves, the ascetic and hedonist shouting over one another. Even so, this tortured posturing has become restrictive, merely invoking awareness of his position, as if that absolves him of meaningful growth. \u201cI know what will happen to my life,\u201d he shared on a website<\/a> that went live on release day. \u201cI have crossed a line and have left my own kind behind , the life of a simple man behind.\u201d Like that passage, this dramatic debut album juggles two tenses. Stifled by the terrified child who will shine is a capable star who largely does not.<\/p>\n

No score yet, be the first to add.<\/p>\n

For the past several years, Fakemink has forged eclecticism from inner conflict, churning out motley PSAs from the angel and devil on his shoulders. Those tensions reached a tipping point on The boy who cried Terrified .<\/a>, a prelude whose topographic sprawl\u2014clipping snares, King Night<\/a> swells, a beautifully morose Burial<\/a> sample\u2014mapped his troubled mind. Conversely, the self-produced Terrified . places a losing wager: sacrificing the range Fakemink does have to make room for a singular statement he cannot yet make. The result is an overlong album whose monotonous palette\u2014percussive and groggily sleazy, as if Black Kray<\/a> studied Snow Strippers<\/a> instead of SALEM<\/a>\u2014illuminates its struggle to say anything whatsoever. \u201cRewind\u201d pleads \u201clook at what you made me,\u201d while the doe-eyed \u201cTell Me What You\u2019re Missing .\u201d insists, \u201cFuck a co-sign, I did it on my own.\u201d The ruthless mercenary of \u201cLike a Virgin\u201d gets \u201cso much money\u201d that he burns it, but the noble miser of \u201c51 Ttashpel Pony Ave .\u201d swears he\u2019s \u201cmaking all this money for my fucking kids.\u201d By paring down his eclectic palette, Fakemink reinforces his rigid concept of stardom as a sudden and absolute curse he must begrudgingly accept, rather than gracefully grow into. He is evidently still figuring things out. I wish he would give himself more room to do so.<\/p>\n

Fakemink\u2019s crossover appeal is a direct product of his omnivorous taste\u2014is this the same guy who gave us \u201cPillowfight<\/a>\u201d and \u201cTraining<\/a>\u201d eight days apart?\u2014and so it feels amiss that the album about his stardom would deny the bug-eyed versatility that earned it. At the same time, Fakemink also thrives with lower stakes, which might partially explain why Terrified . falls short of his freewheeling back catalog. The best songs here sound like loosies, and feel much more relieving than the interludes: \u201cHard Candy\u201d is a syrupy jolt from the 8-bit universe of Revengeseekerz<\/a>, while a dead-eyed Mink slides all over \u201cWrong Relief,\u201d its sparseness anchoring his strongest rapping performance. Nonetheless, these occasional flashes of precocity are outnumbered by banalities\u2014some recurring, like \u201cI got the baddest bitch alive\u201d (\u201cKiss of Death\u201d; \u201cForget me Not .\u201d), and others thankfully not recurring, like \u201cI was lost, now I\u2019m found like Nemo.\u201d Terrified is album-as-telescope, a grand attempt to establish Fakemink as a sunlike star. Behold the paranoid, ever-expanding giant. Behold the blemishes, suddenly bigger than they seemed before.<\/p>\n