

When Babyface Ray’s first Unfuckwitable EP dropped in 2021, his Team Eastside comrade Peezy had just come home from an 18-month prison sentence, and Ray had become one of Detroit’s most prolific and influential rappers while his mentor was away. His success has only blossomed in the years leading up to its sequel. In day-to-day terms, as he says on “Jiffy Mix,” “You know you rich when n****s approaching you with business plans.” But perhaps a larger sign of his achievement is that the intro “Love 4 Me” features an appearance from the other Babyface—the R&B icon with 13 Grammys and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Unfuckwitable 2 has three times as many songs as its predecessor (the original EP had seven songs; its deluxe had 14) and is full of his distinctive unshakably calm, observational bars. “My Thoughts 6” continues his long-standing introspective series with memories of losing his clothes in a flood, and later earning enough money to buy his mother’s old house. On “FR Williams,” he tells his son that he can’t come to his school because it may cause too much of a scene among his friends and their mothers. But another highlight from the song shows that his success was inevitable. “Before the money, man, these n****s couldn’t tell me shit,” he boasts. “I was a born leader, I had my own vision.”