From the DC Universe to the internet writ large, JPEGMAFIA’s heroes span genres and mediums. The producer and rapper’s pantheon is expansive and colorful, a bustling splash page of influences and pop culture totems. While JPEG has never downplayed the prominent roles that anime, video games, and wrestling play in his music, the adrenalized politics of his past projects sometimes obscured that scope. Listening to a song like “I Just Killed a Cop Now I’m Horny,” for instance, the morose Ai Aso sample always felt overshadowed by the flamboyant title and JPEG’s anti-cop lyrics. All My Heroes Are Cornballs adjusts that imbalance by laying bare the sprawling collage in his brain and showcasing how seamlessly it all fits together. The record feels like a public access show on an interdimensional cable channel: unhinged and trippy, but still deeply earnest.
All My Heroes is a significant departure from his earlier work. But for as dense as it sounds, there’s a quiet accessibility to how JPEG performs and structures these songs. He adopts gendered terms like thot, slut, and girl, leaning into Peggy, his feminine nickname, and stages a few songs from the perspective of a woman. It’s unclear what they might signify about his own identity, but they further the idea that his fearlessness is his superpower. As a producer, he builds his hyper-syncretic songs around concord rather than contrast. The distorted guitar riff on “Rap Grow Old and Die x No Child Left Behind” acts as a springboard for the vocals and other instruments, converting all the friction into motion. The crackle of a recorded fire on “DOTS FREESTYLE REMIX” fills the spaces between JPEG’s boasts and the cutesy synth tune. He’s adept at making disparate sounds and images cohere without sacrificing texture or invoking an exaggerated sense of audacity. In a year full of nods to diaspora and lineage, his productions are a reminder that even randomness can be personal.
Sounds and sequences that would have been codas or flourishes in his past music are allowed to fully blossom, even in passing. “Kenan Vs. Kel” shuffles through keyboard melodies before settling on a riff that morphs into a dusty beat. Then, halfway through, a crunchy power chord shows up and is stretched like sheet metal as it’s hammered with percussion. JPEG raps on both parts, and as busy as that sounds, the shifts are effortless, like swiping between smartphone apps. “Grimy Waifu,” a gun ode with a gorgeous downtempo backbeat, folds in flute spirals and acoustic guitar riffs as JPEG sings in AutoTune of his weapon’s commitment to him. It’s as ridiculous as it is dazzling.