The King of Teens is 25

I’ve been working with my friend Tim Forkin on video editing for Rally for a while now. He’s super talented and is one of very few people with legit unique takes on social media and content. Here’s a post from his newsletter last week I wanted to share:

I wrote this long before you're reading it, and right this moment I'm jamming to Lil Yachty's album Let's Start Here.If you're unfamiliar (or my mom), let me set the scene:

1. A rapper who once called himself the "King of the Teens" is now 25 years old and still making hits — in October 2022 he went mega viral with a song about taking drugs to Poland. Great guy.

2. He's collaborated with all sorts of artists, including an entire mixtape dedicated to working with rappers from Michigan (my favorite rap sub-genre), and produced songs for Drake's most recent album.

3. This time, he took a complete left-turn — trading rap music for a full psychedelic rock album unlike anything he’s ever made before. And, the best part… it’s actually good!

I’m so fascinated by music & the crazy industry that surrounds it. In any normal profession, getting to the very peak of your career and then turning into a hippie is career suicide.
If the world’s top insurance saleswoman started telling her clients, “You know, what are we actually insuring anyway? Our bodies are just the vessel to our soul…”

She’d be out of a job. Meanwhile, Lil Yachty used the years of goodwill he’s built doing one genre extremely well, and turned it into something completely different he also enjoys.

There’s a ton of content about niching down vs. becoming the niche, and those conversations can often become a bunch of TikTok growth garbage.

I think most creators should follow Lil Yachty’s path — do one thing super well, experiment within it, gain notoriety, and parlay the diehard fanbase you build into a platform with room for everything you’re interested in.

Each of us has other topics we want to create about…They’ll just have to wait for now.

Talk soon,
Tim