Steve 'Flash' Juon“Rock star
I’ve been on some shit niggaz not
Always jock hard”
Fort Worth rapper Iayze was previously known as Jace! Coincidentally that’s also his real first name — sans the exclamation point of course. Since it trips up my brain to type an exclamation point after his name in the middle of a sentence, Jace will have to forego it for the rest of this “Monarch” review. Released back in 2021, “Monarch” was part of Jace’s ascension to notoriety, thanks largely to his tracks reaching a much wider audience on TikTok. It’s not hard to find videos with his music there.
Listening to “Mad at Me” confirms all the elements for virality are there. It’s under 80 seconds long, it’s got a bumping bass, and Jace is more than happy to talk shit. “Big gun make a opp not breathe/bad bitch wan’ go overseas/heard these niggaz wanna blow at me.” It’s a non-stop stream of bragging and trash talking in the most syrupy pitch correction possible. I strongly suspect for Jace’s fans it’s less about what he says and more about how he says it. He’s the prototype for this style of rap.
While I can see the appeal from here, I also have to take a step back and look at the whole forest. Even on sub-two minute songs, it’s not hard for Jace to run out of new things to say. The phrase “bad bitch” seems to end up in almost every song. I’m not suggesting casual misogyny should be creative, but c’mon bro, can you at least call a woman a trick or a ho once in a while? “My money more important than some bad bitches” quips Jace on “Lean In It.” I think any woman with him has figured that out.
I’m gonna be real about this and say that “Monarch” wasn’t made for me. I may be ADHD on some level but I don’t need my songs to be this short. Or perhaps more specifically — short songs are fine, but short songs that sound exactly the same and say exactly the same things don’t work for me, because they blend together into one long repetitive song. I’m scoring “Monarch” based on my interest in listening to it again, but to be clear Jace! a/k/a Iayze should absolutely continue to ride the TikTok/Spotify/etc. gravy train for as long as he can. Make that money man.