French Montana - Jungle Rules

Pitchfork 65

With features from Future, Quavo, Young Thug, and T.I., French Montana returns newly motivated with his sophomore album, which acts as a funnel for everyone’s strongest qualities but his own.

The Guardian 0

(Black Butter)

The rapper’s cohesive second album nods to 2017’s most zeitgeisty sounds: swirling trap on Migo Montana with Quavo, sultry R&B on She Workin with Marc E Bassy, even dancehall with the air horn-heavy Formula, featuring Alkaline. Montana understands how best to capitalise on features – Pharrell rapping on Bring Dem Things is glorious – yet simultaneously, when drawing on his Moroccan roots with Arabic-style beats on Famous, this is an artist trying to keep a sense of his own voice throughout the cleverly curated party songs. At 18 tracks, Jungle Rules is too long, but provides the “playlist generation” with bangers to choose from.