Cameron Graves - Seven
Cameron Graves described this project as thrash jazz, and that fits perfectly. He came onto my radar back with Kamasi Washington’s 2015 opus, The Epic. This is his second full length project since then, and this project is definitely the more genre pushing of the two. Cameron described the inspiration by saying that he wanted to write metal music for the piano. He easily succeeds in his goal of this experimentation, but I’m not sure if I’m 100% sold on the project. When the project does hit, it really hits. “Sons of Creation” and “Sacred Spheres” feature some insanely heavy riffs while the Kamasi Washington assisted “Paradise Trinity” and “Seven” provide a slightly smoother aspect to this project. The transition between these two sounds on a track like “Super Universes” really shows the uniqueness of Cameron’s music. Even with the runtime being slightly over 30 minutes, it does start to feel a bit long and samey to me. The novelty kind of wears itself out by the end of the project. Either way though, the highlights at minimum are worth hearing for any jazz or thrash fan.
Pino Palladino & Blake Mills - Notes With Attachments
Pino Palladino has had one of the most illustrious careers of any bassist. Over almost 40 years of playing, he’s been on albums by D’angelo, The Who, John Mayer, Elton John, Adele, Ed Sheeran, Erykah Badu, and many more. At the age of 63, Pino has decided to release his first ever album. Notes With Attachments is just over 30 minutes of some weird, minimalistic, spiritual jazz. Even with its short runtime, this album spans a wide margin of influences. A song like “Ekute” has some Cuban or African influences, while “Soundwalk” seems almost like a minimal swing era track. You can almost tell from the song title what the track is going to be like, and I can’t not mention the track “Chris Dave”. The song obviously contains Chris playing the drums, and also falls into this tight groove that morphs throughout the runtime. Chris has also had an insane career, producing for everyone from influential soul artists like D’angelo and Anderson Paak to pop icons like Adele and Justin Bieber. You definitely have to be in a certain mood to listen to Notes With Attachments, but Pino Palladino and Blake Mills did not disappoint with such a sought-after project.
Genesis Owusu - Smiling With No Teeth
I will hopefully have a more detailed review of this project in my college paper when this comes out (link is right here to read a longer that), but it’s still more than worth a mention over here. Smiling With No Teeth will easily go down as one of the best debuts of this year, and Genesis proves he can do a bit of everything on this project. Aggressive punk-inspired bangers are no trouble for him, and neither are indie folk songs about fishing. He does some quality rapping on “I Don’t See Colour” and “Whip Cracker”, but is also just as comfortable with silky hooks like on “Gold Chains” and “No Looking Back”. He even has one that sounds like an indie hit with “Don’t Need You”. It sounds like he’s taking the weirdness and eccentricity of people like Prince and Gorillaz, and making it into his own sound. Three months into the year and this is easily one of the best albums I’ve heard so far.
Denzel Curry & Kenny Beats - Unlocked 1.5
There aren’t that many remix projects anymore, so I was fairly excited to see what this project would bring. The feature list looked insane from the outside, but this project ends up being pretty hit or miss. Denzel having no new verses is a bit of a disappointment, but most tracks have some sort of new vocalist. Robert Glasper provides a luscious instrumental to “So Incredible.pkg” and Smino adds a nice new verse. Benny The Butcher does his thing on “Diet_1.5”, especially when he starts his verse by saying, “Treat the game like Trump voters did the Capitol building.” Kenny Mason and Sango show up for the remix of “Pyro” and both add quite a bit in their respective parts. The “Track07” remix with Georgia Anne Muldrow and Arlo Parks was a big surprise, but both of them show their respective strengths. The rest of the project is just ok, and doesn’t quite live up to the tracklist hype. The original is easily superior to this project, but this is still worth a listen for fans of Denzel.
Benny the Butcher & Harry Fraud - The Plugs I Met 2
There’s no denying that Benny the Butcher is one of the best rappers out right now, and he’s back again with his first project of 2021, The Plugs I Met 2. It’s another one producer collaboration project, this time by fellow New York citizen Harry Fraud. This is a follow up to his 2019 EP with features from Black Thought and Pusha T. The tracklist visually doesn’t live up to that project, as the features on here are a lot worse than those artists, but Benny comes through with another great project. There are a few tracks on here that don’t really add much, and the features don’t usually add a lot either, but his charisma and Harry’s beats are just too great to be denied. “Live By It” and “Plug Talk” with 2 Chainz both are phenomenal examples of Benny’s descriptions of his previous life dealing drugs. “Talkin Back” has a fantastic familiar flute sample and even Fat Joe’s poor verse doesn’t ruin the entire song. “No Instructions” has additional production from Griselda producer Daringer and he helps bring the grimey, slow beat for some introspective bars from Benny. Benny continues to be one of the most consistent rappers and hopefully he can make something even better in the future.
Guapdad 4000 & !llmind - 1176
Guapdad 4000 constantly puts out music, but this album is his most thoughtful and cohesive yet. The album title is the number of the house that Guapdad used to live in when he was growing up. That’s not to say everything on here is serious, but it’s the closest he’s been so far. A song like “She Wanna” is clearly not serious at all, but it’s still a classic west coast banger with the new sound. But on the other hand, a song like “Chicken Adobo” is a love song comparing his attraction for his girlfriend to a traditional filipino dish he ate growing up. “Uncle Ricky” shows Guapdad doing some storytelling about his uncle’s life, and it actually ends up pretty well. Thoughtful is not what I would’ve described Guapdad’s music before this, but I’m glad he’s surprising me. The overall sound of the record isn’t anything special, just a combination of Bay Area hip hop and current day R&B, but Guapdad continues to show that he’s one of the best using this sound currently.
Lana Del Rey - Chemtrails Over the Country Club
Lana Del Rey is back again with her first project since 2019’s bombshell Norman F*cking Rockwell. This project comes after her spoken word book last year and a plethora of tone deaf controversies. This project doesn’t live up to her last project, but there will probably be some people that will really enjoy it. The production here is more minimal, her voice is even lower in the mix, and the really clean instrumentals from her previous album are gone. Instead, the washy production and vocals are back that a lot of her hardcore fans love, but it’s not something that me as a passive listener really enjoys. There are some interesting moments though. The vocal performance on “White Dress” is something completely new for her, “Yosemite” also has some great vocals, and “Wild at Heart” is reminiscent of NFR. There’s just not enough entertaining music on here for me to take the time needed to understand all the stories on here.
Jahmed - Armani
Jahmed’s 2020 project THEBOOFMOBILE showed me that he had a lot of potential and Armani is another step in the right direction. It’s not mind blowing or him creating a new sound, unlike someone like Kenny Mason, but he’s got everything that can make a great rapper. He knows how to flow perfectly over both the aggressive and slow songs, the two sided track “Q&A // WOOSAH” is a good example of this. His ability to create an immediately catchy chorus with a different vocal approach is noticeable on the album highlights “USAY” and “ROADBLOCK”. Freddie Gibbs takes over the trap banger “GLIMPSE” and shows that Jahmed still has a ways to go to reach the top echelon of current day rappers. I understand that Suga Free is a huge name in hip hop, but his interludes didn’t really add much to the project. Armani is another really entertaining collection of bangers from a great hip hop up-and-comer.
Blu DeTiger - How Did We Get Here?
This is a quick under 20-minute EP filled with a bunch of bass driven songs. Blu just got popular this year from TikTok, but she’s also been playing in live bands for artists like Caroline Polachek. Although these songs are self-described as funk by her, they don’t really sound like funk songs. Instead, I would classify them as funky pop songs. If you look at them as strictly funk songs, I feel like they would fail most of the qualifications. It’s like what a TikToker probably thinks funk is. Either way though, this is still a solid EP. Her basslines are generally the best part of each song. The songwriting is fairly standard and her voice isn’t anything special either. A couple highlights are the straightforward pop song “Vintage”, the fantastic instrumental “disco banger but you’re crying in the bathroom”, and another instantly catchy tune called “Night Shade”. I’m not sure if I’ll be looking for her new music, but this project is still pretty decent, especially for what it is.
Al-Doms - New Dream
Al-Doms is someone I just heard about for the first time recently and after seeing that album cover, I knew I had to listen to this. There’s nothing on here that he does differently than other people, but he proves that he can do every type of hip hop well. The trap bangers are on here with the great beatswitch of “Rat Race” and the straightforward “Tic Toc”. The socially conscious feeling comes through on the “Just Anutha”. “Ice Cream” and “Slang!” are smoother hip hop cuts that show his ability to rap. “I Wonder” ends the project on a six and a half minute long melodic track that’s immediately different from anything else on the project. The repeated refrain of, “Where do we go when we die, I wonder, if it matter at all,” hits home, as my anxiety filled brain has been forcing me to constantly think about this question for the past month. Al-Doms puts himself as in rotation as someone who has a lot of talent and is already making really good hip hop in all the different styles.
Mindy Meng Wang & Tim Shiel - Nervous Energy
This is a random project I ended up finding on Bandcamp between an avant-garde composer and an electronic producer. Mindy is the composer and plays a traditional 21-string guzheng instrument. It helps make everything sound otherworldly, classic, and makes it feel like a story is being told. She would start the songs with her instrument, and then Tim Shiel would turn them into dance songs. It’s a fascinating combination of sounds, combining an instrument that’s been around for thousands of years with technology that’s only become prevalent in the past couple decades. There are quite a few different types of electronic songs on here too. “Sleeping Tiger On The Bund” starts off the project as a full off dance track, but the project ends on “My Love Is Not What It Was”, which is a calmer track that sounds almost like a lofi-beat-to-study-to for most of the track. The idea is one of the coolest I’ve seen in music so far this year, and the execution comes through as well.
Vegyn - Like A Good Old Friend
Vegyn is a close collaborator of Frank Ocean, including helping to produce his two 2016 masterpieces Endless and Blonde. Even outside of Frank, he’s been on projects by HAIM, JPEGMAFIA, Travis Scott, and Kali Uchis. He released a solo album in 2019, but I just never got around to it. This EP on the other hand, is my first official introduction to Vegyn’s music. It’s a short collection of electronic and club driven music that shows he’s a competent producer. “B4 The Computer Crash” was the single and deservedly so. It devolves into this computer sounding drop that’s perfectly for a late night dance party either by yourself or a couple close friends. The title track is also a pleasing instrumental song yet again. “Mushroom Abolitionist” is a lowkey house track that although it doesn’t tread any new ground, is still an interesting song. This project isn’t one that will turn a lot of heads, but it shows that Vegyn is still a good producer for himself as well.
Comments