On February 27th, AJ Tracey uploaded a cryptic Instagram post captioned “next week we go again”, alongside two images: one of the rapper sitting on a table in a restaurant with a bottle of champagne, and the other of a piece of paper with the date “4/3/21” written on it. This has led to speculation that Tracey will be releasing new music this coming Thursday, with the first image perhaps a snapshot taken from a forthcoming music video.
The artist’s most recent musical outing was a collaboration with fellow West London rapper Digga D on ‘Bringing it Back’, which has currently generated over six million views on YouTube since its release on February 4th. The track’s music video sees both artists allude to respective freestyles that helped popularise them, with Tracey occupying the same studio that featured in his famous ‘Packages’ freestyle on Link Up TV in 2016 and Digga D returning to the riverside setting of his renowned ‘Next Up’ freestyle on Mixtape Madness in 2017.
It is unknown yet whether whatever Tracey is dropping this Thursday will involve a collaborator, nor do we have any information on any upcoming album or shows that the rapper could be planning. What we do know, however, is that Thursday March 4th is also the 26-year-old’s birthday, and so his fans may be expecting a particularly special treat.
The rapper’s last album was his self-titled debut ‘AJ Tracey’ which dropped in 2019, peaking at number three in the UK albums charts. On the project, the versatile Londoner experimented with a variety of genres and sounds, ranging from country-inspired trap songs to soca-infused R&B tracks, with the latter being inspired by his Trinidadian heritage. Most notably, the project included the summer anthem ‘Ladbroke Grove’, a track celebrating the neighbourhood in London that the rapper grew up in. The song has also been integral to the recent revival of the UK garage sound from the early 2000s, a sound that will undoubtedly make many appearances this summer as people hope to celebrate a world without COVID-induced restrictions.
4/3/21
— aj (@ajtracey) February 28, 2021
If this Thursday is the beginning of a run of singles that may lead up to the rapper’s second album, it is likely that we will witness the same versatility that Tracey exhibited on his debut. As far back as 2018, in an interview with Esquire, the rapper implored his listeners to not categorise him according to one specific genre, saying, “Just don’t call me a grime artist”. Tracey clearly did not want to be bound to the sound that he originally came up doing, and so it is likely that any possible music he may be dropping this coming Thursday will continue his attempts to explore different musical avenues.
