Brooklyn rapper Young M.A is a star on the rise thanks to his snarling single “Ooouuu,” with its wafting, dreamlike synth and its sparse (and sparsely deployed) beats. The YouTube video for “Ooouuu” has accumulated more than 25 million views since it was uploaded in May, and other rappers have contributed to the song’s popularity by recording their own versions—among them Nicki Minaj and A$AP Ferg. Meek Mill used the track to dis LA rapper the Game (who also released his own take on the song), and last week Calumet City native Tink put her own spin on “Ooouuu.”
Tink coats her voice in Auto-Tune for her version, and the rapper-singer begins by proclaiming, “They say your mixtape sounds like an album.” She dropped the fourth volume in her ongoing Winter’s Diary mixtape series at the end of August, and the lushly produced new chapter sounds as much like a studio album as most mixtapes do these days. Fewer and fewer artists seem inclined to make the kind of rough-and-tumble collection of freestyles, experiments, and remixes of popular songs that used to get called a “mixtape.”
Like most of Tink’s output, Winter’s Diary 4 bridges the gap between luxurious R&B and aggressive rap. On “Ooouuu Freestyle” she focuses on delivering barbed bars, though the Auto-Tune makes even her most acidic lines shimmer. You can listen to that track (and to all of Winter’s Diary 4) below.