quinn sf44 cover art
The FADER’s “Songs You Need” are the tracks we can’t stop playing. Check back every day for new music and follow along on our Spotify playlist.
Earlier this year, quinn purged her official streaming platforms of a significant amount of her discography, specifically the music she made during her emergence as a compelling voice in the world of hyperpop. The decision divided fans, some of whom were upset to see some of their favorite quinn tracks disavowed. But one could argue that supporting an unsigned, teenage artist with integrity and vision means that preparations should be made for drastic, scorched-earth declarations.
Prior to the wipe, quinn had moved away from the experimental pop slurries of her debut album drive-by lullabies and leaned into her talents as an underground rapper and producer, resulting in her sophomore LP quinn and a prolific streak of mixtape releases. The latest, sf44, richly reimagines pluggnb for the beat scene, its glossy R&B samples sped up, sliced, and interrupted by more samples that sound like they’re being triggered in real-time.
On “Rat Race” — a collaboration with FearDorian, a 16-year-old producer from Atlanta — quinn remains riddled with anxiety and defiantly protective of what makes her special. With a freestyle’s looseness, she offers a vibrant self-portrait: she’s afraid of snakes, not of standing out (“Walkin’ round in tall grass, be careful/Ain’t no Trues on my ass, I’m a weirdo”). Her flexes feel intentionally half baked, as though they’re meant to underscore her far richer bars about alienation, self-medication, and protecting herself by any means necessary. These are themes quinn is familiar with, but a side effect of her limitless artistic development is the new dimensions she reveals of what we already know.
