The flute is finally getting the respect it deserves. Thanks to Future's "Mask Off," taken from this year's very good self-titled album, a single sampled flute has inspired a new social media challenge. The growing #MaskOffChallenge hashtag puts black musicians in the spotlight with flute, recorder, violin, and piano covers of the Metro Boomin and Southside-produced cut.
The covers, spotted early by Fader, range from mind-blowingly great to hilariously tongue-in-cheek. Check out some of our favorites:
The particular flute section in question comes from Tommy Butler's "Prison Song," a selection off the 1976 release Selma Album: A Musical Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Both Future's self-titled album, home to "Mask Off," and its immediate follow-up HNDRXX topped the Billboard 200. The back-to-back No. 1 debuts made history, giving Future the distinction of being the first artist in the chart's six-decade history to pull it off. HNDRXX debuted with 121,00 equivalent units, while the self-titled release opened with 140,000.