It’s difficult to say if Dominic Fike’s output is the inevitable result of our multicultural musical monoculture (an oxymoronic irony for sure) or if he and his team’s creative choices are attempting to contribute to its continued dominance. While he could very well be from Los Angeles, New York, or maybe even Atlanta, Fike, a product of a fractured childhood and drug addiction, is from Florida’s Gulf Coast. Guess he’s turned it around since he signed to Columbia Records, guested on a single by Jennie from Blackpink, and contributed a track to the Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse soundtrack.
Despite whatever off-screen issues have arisen, success hasn’t revealed anything shy of virtuosity. Fike’s smooth voice slides out from between stop-start grooves that like to pop on and off, as if a fidgety robot engineer can’t keep its metallic fingers from hitting mute buttons on different instrument tracks. He rolls between tuneful vocals with easy range and backs into quickly knitted rap verses without any hiccups to speak of.
There’s also a vitality that comes with what passes for actual instruments like clean guitars, deep bass foundations, and in-the-pocket drums. All of this to say that his aesthetic hovers effortlessly between a kind of gassed-out slackerism and a hyped-up MC exiting a very expensive automobile, supported by unexpected production decisions and curious lyrical turns that make for an engaging listen.
With a guitar style that is clearly influenced by the Red Hot Chili Peppers (though much less annoying), Fike pirouettes from rapping through autotune to stepping back for a pretty string section on “Açai Bowl.”
Seeing that “Babydoll” from his first demo mixtape has topped more than 1.6 billion streams on Spotify—when it’s only a very punk rock one minute and 37 seconds long—adds to the impressive feats of audio that raise the initial question: Are we, TikTok-ers included, more accepting of artistic variation that draws on any and all genres in the same song, or are we just living in a post-genre world? Either way, Fike is unencumbered by the past—his or ours.
CAUTION: The writer’s unrestrained cynicism and unresolved issues shape the writing of this opinion column. Results may vary.
