That's Unheard Of!

Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All’s “Oldie” is the best song of 2012 so far. A true posse rap, its muscular 10 1/2-minute runtime gives every member of the OFWGKTA crew a chance to shine.

In addition to bits by Taco, Domo Genesis, Left Brain, Mike G and Hodgy Beats, de facto frontman Tyler, the Creator gets two verses; the group’s non-musical member, Jasper Dolphin, spits a nine-bar; crooner Frank Ocean flexes his rapping chops; and, most crucially, Earl Sweatshirt delivers a truly monstrous flow.

It’s a great verse — arguably the best on the track — but that’s not why it’s significant.

The main reason Earl Sweatshirt’s verse on “Oldie” dropped jaws is because Earl Sweatshirt disappeared for more than a year prior to its release.

He was gone for so long, in fact, that the lyric “Free Earl” has appeared on nearly as many Odd Future tracks as Earl has.

The now-18-year-old rapper’s return makes him a prodigal son of sorts, though rejoining the Odd Future fold after a stint at a Samoan boarding school turns the Biblical myth on its head.

If the recorded “Oldie” verse weren’t a loud enough return, Earl also joined the group for a live rendition of the song at New York’s Hammerstein Ballroom on March 20.

YouTube videos of the performance show a Wolf Gang even more enthusiastic about Earl’s presence than its audience, with Tyler, the Creator bursting into an uncontrollable grin when his best friend joins him onstage for the first time.

Earl’s return has done more than giving Odd Future its most talented rapper back. It’s also reminded us why we fell in love with Odd Future in the first place.

Last year’s “Goblin” LP by Tyler, the Creator was the first high-profile Odd Future release.

The hype that surrounded it before it dropped, based largely on the strength of lead single “Yonkers”, gave way to crushing disappointment and a series of debates about the Wolf Gang’s often misogynistic and homophobic lyrics.

Almost overnight, the music world’s wide-eyed excitement about a crew of teenaged Los Angeles skate punks with immeasurable gifts for rapping and beat-making transformed into resentment for a bunch of hooligans who were really old enough to know better.

The absence of Earl, Odd Future’s youngest member, seemed almost metaphorical for the group’s lost innocence.

His return comes with something of a sea change for OFWGKTA. Tyler, the Creator told SPIN that “talking about rape and cutting bodies up, it just doesn’t interest me anymore,” and indeed, “The Odd Future Tape Vol. 2” shies away from the horrorcore themes that dominated the first tape and “Goblin.”

The Golf Wang hooligans haven’t exactly grown up, but they’re more conscious of their strengths and have learned to play to them.

That’s why Earl’s return feels more like continuity than change.

Odd Future needed a year to flounder without his stabilizing presence.

Now that he’s back, it feels as though the band is finally ready for him. “Oldie” is the best song the group has ever done, but it couldn’t have happened in 2009 when Earl was a 15-year-old wunderkind and the rest of the Wolf Gang was practicing its kickflips.

Earl’s time away galvanized the crew — the “Free Earl” maxim remains the most mature Wolfism — and his return came at a time when they finally seemed prepared to channel their talent into something productive.

If the sky was always Odd Future’s limit, now it finally feels attainable.