12 years, eight albums, and roughly 1,459 mixtapes into his career, Future may be on the verge of his best release yet—at least title-wise.. On April 25th he announced that his forthcoming LP will be called I Never Liked You, a perfect distillation of the Atlanta star’s brand of supreme swagger, serious self-loathing and toxic behavior on and off wax. It’s both vulnerable and spiteful, petty and wounded.
As a bonus, the rapper chose to use a Gregory Harris photo from his recent GQ cover story for the album art. Specifically, the image shows him luxuriously dressed in a burgundy Valentino suit with a matching eye mask in the backseat of a Rolls Royce.
I Never Liked You will be Future’s first solo album since 2020’s High Off Life. He hasn’t released much music from the project, but “Worst Day,” a debaucherous woe-is-me single about how hard Valentine’s Day is when you’ve got to get gifts for a small army of women, indicates that it is romance-centric. He said as much in his GQ interview.
“Putting this project together is just people understanding that I love hard,” he explained. “Probably love the hardest. I wanted to showcase my skills as far as melodies and topics and being vulnerable.”
Future has shared a few key bits of information about the album, including that it could feature Detroit rapper Babyface Ray, and a new collaboration with FKA twigs (their second). And as he told Elliott Wilson for GQ, appearances from Kanye, who he’s been spending a lot of time with lately, as well as his perennial collaborator Drake will make the cut too. If the themes of romance and vulnerability bear out across the project, it could be stylistically similar to 2019’s Save Me EP or 2017’s Hndrxx, which features some of the rapper’s most chaotic songs (here’s a refresher on the lyrics to “My Collection” and “Hallucinating” to show where his head may be at).
“I’m putting myself out there. Sharing my lifestyle with the world. Sharing my pain with the world. Sharing my ups, sharing my downs with the entire universe. I believe in the energy of the universe and manifestation,” Future told GQ. “That’s why I’m giving myself, because I’m willing to correct myself. I don’t want to just…be wrong. I’m willing to give you all of me, so you can tell me how to build on me, and make me a better me.”
Despite the album’s throughline of honesty amidst struggle, Future stressed to GQ that he’s “genuinely happy with life” outside of his career, something he admitted hasn’t always been the case. He emphasized his appreciation for his network and support system in an effusive April 25 tweet.
“My producers, my brothers, my family, the ones that I create art with, the same ones one call away anytime I need ‘em, I wanna thank [you] whether [you] off or on the album,” he wrote. “Continue being great.”