What's the Use?
Mac Miller
This track is one of the most purely joyful things Mac Miller ever recorded, and it arrives like a burst of pressurized air. A live band locks into a funk groove that is genuinely hard to sit still through — horns stab and wail, the bass is rubbery and insistent, and the entire production feels like it's sweating. The guest roster turns it into a celebration, trading verses and hooks with an energy that compounds rather than dilutes. Mac's performance here is loose and confident, leaning into absurdist wordplay that showcases how he could pivot between hedonism and wit without losing coherence. Emotionally it's a rare uncomplicated pleasure in his catalog — not naive, but genuinely high-spirited, the sound of someone in a moment of ease. It draws on the P-Funk and early-nineties jazz-rap tradition but carries it forward with contemporary looseness. The lyrics are rooted in excess, but they wear it lightly — there's delight in the extravagance rather than numbness. Reach for this when the afternoon feels open and you want something that will make a room feel larger, looser, more alive.
fast
2010s
bright, dense, live
American hip-hop, P-Funk and early-90s jazz-rap tradition
Hip-Hop, Funk. Jazz-Rap Funk. euphoric, playful. Explodes with immediate joy and sustains it through collective energy that only builds throughout.. energy 9. fast. danceability 9. valence 9. vocals: loose confident male rap, witty, high-spirited, absurdist wordplay. production: live horns, rubbery bass, live drums, P-Funk influenced, layered and sweating. texture: bright, dense, live. acousticness 5. era: 2010s. American hip-hop, P-Funk and early-90s jazz-rap tradition. Open afternoon when you want something that makes a room feel larger and looser.