Lil Baby on Younger Streamers Rating Songs: 'Won't Really Understand'

Lil Baby has shared his thoughts on the new era of streamers providing live reactions to new albums.

In his Complex cover story interview with Jordan Rose, the Atlanta rapper was asked about popular Twitch streamer Kai Cenat's review of his new album, WHAM. When Cenat listened to the album on his stream, he said he'd give WHAM a 6.5/10 after one listen. "I saw little clips of it," Lil Baby said when asked about Cenat's reaction. "But people like Kai Cenat, I feel like they're younger. They won't really understand how I'm coming. You have to be a little older to really get it."

The 30-year-old rapper is right that there's a gap in age between him and streamers like Kai Cenat, who turned 23 last month. "I never used to think that there was any age demographic [that was] good to rate music unless you're a music person," he continued. "If it was a music person, then I'd probably be more interested. But the streamers and people who do reviews, that's just their personal opinion. They know nothing about music for real."

He said that he respects "everybody's opinion," but he's more inclined to listen to what a music pundit or journalist has to say about his music than a streamer. "I see people post that they hate a song, but they still playing the song," he added. "You’re saying you don’t like it and you’re making a whole ordeal about it, but the song is playing in the background. So it's really more to go viral or to get a reaction. People would do anything to get a reaction."

Regardless, he said he's never really "paid attention to it, whether it was a great review or not," and he would prefer to listen to a project and form his opinion before checking out what others think. Even if Kai Cenat wasn't too hot on the album, WHAM debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 140,000 equivalent album units, beating out Bad Bunny's sixth studio album Debí Tirar Más Fotos.

Read the full cover story with Lil Baby here.