Steve 'Flash' JuonTen minutes after sitting in front of my keyboard without writing a single word about “Five Forever” by PlaqueBoyMax, I decided the only way out of my dilemma was to explain it to the rest of you. I know from doing my due diligence before beginning that Maxwell Elliot Dent is a big deal. My lack of familiarity with his Twitch streaming career or FaZe Clan membership says what I already knew — we’re from two different generations. If you’re Max’s age or younger you’re probably one of the two million people who subscribed to him in the last four years. Before saying anything about his music I want to show my respect to him for that achievement and congratulate him on his success.
“I do what I want and they hate that”
I’m sure they do Max. In fact the handle PlaqueBoyMax is his way of flaunting success in the face of his haters. Anyone who reaches 100,000 subscribers on YouTube gets a plaque from Google recognizing their success, much like how in the old days you got a gold or platinum plaque from the RIAA when you sold 500K or a million albums respectively. Max gained 200,000 subscribers with his Basement Boyz crew there BEFORE he became a successful Twitch streamer. If I can’t get across anything else in the opening paragraphs of this review to you I hope this one point sticks — Max gets the internet. He knows how to make content, he knows how to promote it, he knows how to engage his audience.
“I’m rich baby, everything paid for”
Reviewing “Five Forever” is arguably my low tier way of doing the same thing. Max will make more from brand deals and the donations his live audience gives him in a day than most of us (myself definitely included) will in a year. A small percentage of his audience, maybe 1/1000th of it at best, will search his name for the latest Max news and come across this review. To them I apologize in advance. I’ve made my best effort to respect Max for his business savvy, his large internet footprint, and his ability to win at anything he does. That doesn’t change the fact I’m completely bored by his album.
“Can’t believe this is my life”
I can’t respect Max if I can’t be honest with the man. Lying to him and kissing his ass would be just as bad as hating him for all that he’s accomplished. The conundrum I had starting my review of “Five Forever” can be boiled down to this statement — what do you say about a successful streamer who makes an incredibly uninteresting album? The signs of what made him a star on YouTube and Twitch are nowhere to be found here. He offers the most generic monotonous tropes of modern rap music he possibly can. He flies first class everywhere. He wears the best drip, hits the finest chicks, and loves flaunting his success. I want him to do all of those things and enjoy his life — I just don’t need to hear him sing-rap about them. For 30 minutes he distills the essence of every successful AutoTune rapper until we reach a pure concentrate that’s syrupy to the touch and so sweet a drop on the tip of a syringe would turn two gallons of water into Kool-Aid. It’s pure candy. There’s no substance to it at all.
“Bitch doing too much, I had to go Casper”
I know Max didn’t intend “Casper” to be an ironic ending to his album, but the character of Casper the Friendly Ghost is older than both Max and I put together. The reference is obvious even to an old head like me — he’s getting ghost, he’s leaving, he’s Audi 5000. So am I. So are you if you made it to the end without quitting. You’re out of here and you’re not coming back. You might come back for his streams on Twitch but you don’t need his carbon copy of today’s trends in rap to accompany them. “Everything I touch is gold, got the Midas touch.” That’s a redundant bar but as I did at the beginning I’ll give Max credit for his success. This album will succeed just because Max put his name on it. For me though he’s saying nothing new and not even doing it in a unique and interesting way. He also has a song called “SOS” and he’s right about that — this is the same ol’ shit.