Travie McCoy “Never Slept Better” Album Review

Never Slept Better

Travie McCoy

• Genre: Hip-Hop/Rap
• Release Date: 2022-07-15
• Explicitness: explicit
• Country: USA
• Track Count: 17
• ℗ 2022 Hopeless Records, Inc.

After spending a decade on the charts with his groundbreaking band Gym Class Heroes and many solo records, McCoy experienced the addiction and mental health issues that are sometimes associated with fame.

Never Slept Better is McCoy’s love letter to that Geneva youngster; it’s an honest look at the last ten years of his life and his triumphant return to music-making. McCoy adopts his most creative form to date and delves into various musical genres on Never Slept Better.

Never Slept Better features some of Travie’s best musicianship and vocal arrangements in his discography, making it one of his best and most real albums. However, the album’s organization and flow sometimes hinder the listening pleasure.

The album is a journey telling the trials and tribulations of addiction, mental health crises, and navigating the shady characters and frustrations one finds in the music industry to get to a place where he could finally be at peace.

Admittedly, this project could have been a dark, depressing tome, but with Travie McCoy, where there is darkness, there is also joy and hopefulness. After years of navigating treacherous waters, Travie McCoy has composed his career’s most honest, vulnerable, raw and emotional music. And he’s never slept better.

Album Cover Art

An older man draped first in dark red paint, then a blue and ash attire is seen sitting on a pile of two books, hanging a backpack with a rolled mat above it, and just casually staring into the distance. He has an empty tin marked “x” balanced on his hat, and in his hands are the tools he had used to create the blue design on the wall beside him.

Behind him is a tin of blue paint that has paint spilling out from here and there, covering some of its sides and base with its content. In front of him is another tin of blue paint, only this one is relatively smaller and has a short brush dipped in it. What is most striking is not the ambience and drama around him or the blue flag hanging from his long paintbrush. Instead, it is the man’s disposition. He does not seem to have any hoots to give. He’s just relaxed and unbothered, reflecting McCoy’s energy on this project.

Tracks and Features

“Love Me Back To Life” is a contemporary disco track with a thick bassline that you might find on a Thundercat song, and “Broken Barometer Blues” is a piano-driven dive-bar song where McCoy seamlessly switches between various vocal patterns. Finally, “Full Monarch” is a duet between a funky R&B ballad and rap passages.

Never Slept Better’s rhythmic ballads are its true heart, despite its unorthodox instrumentation. The listener gets a deep dive into McCoy’s personal life in a way that has never been done before. On “The Bridge,” as an illustration: “The other day I was looking out the window, sitting, thinking how my cousin took his own life. We had just exchanged words. So I thought it was my fault. You should’ve seen me. I was buggin’ out the whole night.”

He is acknowledging that the path to true happiness is doing the things that matter most to you and not just to please anyone else. The album, which has seventeen songs and lasts 52 minutes, drags on at times as the sparser rap tracks cluster and prolonged silences.

The interludes, which include fuzzy PA-style announcements from “Matty’s Mattresses,” a store with the same slogan as the record’s name, seem weirdly disconnected from the remainder of the song. Aside from that direct link, the interludes don’t feel like they add much to the record; instead, they feel like pressing pause. But indeed, a great piece of work altogether.

Tracklist

NO	Title	Artist	Time
1	..Never Slept Better..	Travie McCoy	0:33
2	Stop It	Travie McCoy	3:48
3	Déjà Fait	Travie McCoy	3:56
4	Loved Me Back to Life	Travie McCoy	3:12
5	The Bridge (feat. Elohim)	Travie McCoy & Elohim	4:04
6	Down and Out in L.A.	Travie McCoy	4:02
7	Matty’s Mattresses: Deluxe La	Travie McCoy	0:31
8	A Spoonful of Cinnamon	Travie McCoy	3:46
9	Another Round	Travie McCoy	3:59
10	Full Monarch	Travie McCoy	3:37
11	Matty’s Mattresses: From Larvae To Monarch	Travie McCoy	1:07
12	I am Pagliacci	Travie McCoy	3:47
13	The Best Part of Revenge	Travie McCoy	4:04
14	Karma Kama Sutra	Travie McCoy	3:49
15	Broken Barometer Blues	Travie McCoy	3:28
16	Matty’s Mattresses: Weatherproof	Travie McCoy	0:35
17	I’ll Never Be Loved (feat. Hamzaa)	Travie McCoy & Hamzaa	4:07

Album Theme

McCoy examines his own emotions about his place in the world on Never Slept Better, talking about the tragedy and heartbreak he has lived through at different points in his life.

Production Credits

Producers on the album include Andy Price, Jarrad K & Jarrad Kritzstein.

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