Pitchfork gives Asake 5.6 score

Asake’s new album is doing two things at once. It is performing like a major Afrobeats release — fast, loud, globally visible — and it is being pulled into the old argument about who gets to define “serious” music. That tension sharpened this week when Pitchfork gave *M$NEY* a 5.6 out of 10, a score that quickly spread across music pages and fan circles online. The timing matters — the album only arrived on May 1, and the rating landed while people were still deciding what this phase of Asake even is. (youtube.com) ### What is *M$NEY* supposed to be? This is Asake’s fourth studio album, released through GIRAN Republic and EMPIRE. It runs 13 tracks and 35 minutes, with guests including DJ Snake, Tiakola, and Kabza De Small. The album’s own framing is pretty clear — bigger canvas, more global production, but sti(youtube.com)t-heavy hooks, streetwise melody, and amapiano swing. (music.apple.com) ### Why did the score hit a nerve? Because 5.6 is not a disaster score, but it reads like a dismissal when the artist is this big and the expectations are this high. Fans were not reacting only to one review. They were reacting to what the number seemed to say — that a record many listeners hear as ambitious, (music.apple.com)uess.” That gap between lived audience response and prestige-critic framing is what lit the fuse. (youtube.com) ### Is the album actually a big departure? Yes — but not in the “he abandoned himself” way. More in the “he widened the frame” way. Apple Music’s album note leans on exactly that tension: Asake is more global-facing here, but the core sound is still intact. Premium Times heard the same thing from an(youtube.com) control. Basically, *M$NEY* sounds like an artist trying to turn velocity into permanence. (music.apple.com) ### So what are people arguing about? Two things. First, whether the album itself is strong. That part is normal. Second — and more interesting — whether Western critical outlets still struggle to evaluate African pop forms without treating familiarity, repetition, or groove-first songwriting as lesser craft. (music.apple.com)essful Afrobeats artist gets a lukewarm institutional score while audience momentum says something else. You can already see that split in early user reactions and music-community chatter around *M$NEY*. (albumoftheyear.org) ### Does the score change anything real? Not everything, but not nothing either. Pitchfork does not control streaming, especially for an artist with Asake’s base. But reviews like this still shape the conversation around “artistic growth.” They can influence how casual listeners frame the album bef(albumoftheyear.org)sts, year-end discourse, crossover tastemaking, all that soft-power stuff. The catch is that *M$NEY* already had momentum before the review cycle settled. (music.apple.com) ### Why is Asake such a flashpoint for this? Because he sits right at the overlap of local dominance and global export. NotjustOk notes that he holds 62 entries on Billboard’s U.S. Afrobeats Songs chart and was recently identified as Spotify Nigeria’s most-streamed artist. When someone at that scale gets a mi(music.apple.com)proxy fight over taste, geography, and who is allowed to set the standard. (notjustok.com) ### What’s the bottom line? The real story is not that Pitchfork gave Asake a 5.6. It is that one number instantly reopened a much older argument. *M$NEY* arrived as a transition album — more introspective, more outward-looking, still very recognizably Asake. The score made that transition feel contested. But the l(notjustok.com) because the album matters.