video review: 'wildflower' by the avalanches

Been waiting to get to this one. I really do wish I loved it more, but it is definitely solid.

Next up... hmm, I think Shura, Fates Warning, and then maybe that indie record... stay tuned!

album review: 'wildflower' by the avalanches

So let's talk a little about sampling.

Now if you've been listening to hip-hop - or really mainstream music at all throughout the past twenty years - you're well aware of this practice, taking a piece of music or sound and using it to build a different song, often warping or flipping it into something brand new in the process. But let's take this a step further, because normally when a hip-hop producer samples something, he adds to it with backbeats and a rapper to flow over it - the sample is not the only part of the composition.

Enter plunderphonics, a fantastic word that describes a narrow subgenre of music where the compositions are entirely composed to samples merged and twisted together so that the fragments barely resemble the original piece and come together for a brand new whole. And what's all the more surprising is that there is often so many samples in these compositions that many are often uncleared, which can lead to a legal nightmare and is the big reason why we don't really see many plunderphonic records, or when we do the samples are often innocuous, from out-of-print videos or music from decades past, long forgotten by everyone else. This takes us to The Avalanches, an Australian electronic group who released a plunderphonic record in 2000 called Since I Left You that would become critically acclaimed for its fusion of samples into a cinematic, world-crossing retro-disco experience. Now going back to relisten to this record... yes, for sure it's a very good record that demands a lot of attention, but I wouldn't say I quite loved it - I appreciated the emotive scope and real earnest power, but it does have its moments that drag and you'd like to think that The Avalanches would have a little more ambition in the final product to make more than 'string section disco', to paraphrase Robert Christgau. And yet from that point it has taken sixteen years to follow it with a new album called Wildflower, which was reportedly created to thematically recapture the euphoric feeling of summer roadtrips, mostly pushed through 60s psychedelic pop. Okay, bit of a smaller scale, but I was definitely intrigued - so did The Avalanches manage to deliver?

video review: 'blank face lp' by schoolboy q

I literally have no idea how this review is going to be received. Seriously no clue. Eh, we'll see what happens.

Next up, let's dig into this Avalanches record, and then maybe Fates Warning and an indie surprise. Stay tuned!

album review: 'blank face lp' by schoolboy q

Man, Schoolboy Q is a frustrating artist for me.

See, I covered him back in 2014 with Oxymoron and while I found that record a slight step away from the genuinely excellent Habits And Contradictions, I still liked Schoolboy Q as an artist. On the tracks where his lyrics can feel stale or formulaic he brings a lot of personality, and when he wants to he can definitely bring a smarter brand of writing to his material, with subtext and insight. He definitely has a place in the Top Dawg stable of MCs, more cutting than Jay Rock's bruising style and grittier than someone like Ab-Soul or Kendrick. In other words, when we consider West Coast gangsta rap, he's probably one of the more accessible artists coming from TDE, and between his collaborations and charting singles, there's proof of that. My problem with Schoolboy Q has always been consistency, balancing out that mainstream appeal with stronger content or production that doesn't drag back his impressive personality.

And yet in the lead-up to this release, I haven't received many requests to cover this album, and I have no idea why. Granted, there hasn't been the huge single like 'Studio' to push this record, and I've already mentioned that I wasn't wild about his collaboration with Kanye West 'That Part', but he's never had great luck with singles anyway and from all accounts this record to be his longest and more elaborate to date. And his list of guest stars was pretty impressive - forget Kanye, when you get Kurrupt, Vince Staples, E-40, Jadakiss, Anderson .Paak, Miguel, and Kendrick contributing hooks, you've got a pretty impressive lineup of quality behind you, most of which deserve to be a lot more famous than they are - which would probably be one of the best ways to describe Schoolboy Q, come to think of it. So I decided to dig into Blank Face LP - how did it turn out?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 23, 2016 (VIDEO)

Another slow week on the Hot 100. Eh, it happens - at least Logic finally debuted, and I didn't hate that new Fergie song quite as much as I thought I would, which I count as a net positive.

But enough wasting time: ScHoolboy Q is up next, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 23, 2016

...well folks, it's the summer lull. High temperatures and vacation means that the charts have fallen into a torpor, with nary a major shift in sight. In other words, we got another slow week - and no guarantee that it's going to be any better.

video review: 'dopamine' by BØRNS

Thank you all for your support, folks - pretty happy how this review turned out too!

Next up is Billboard BREAKDOWN and Schoolboy Q, so stay tuned!

album review: 'dopamine' by BØRNS

I have to admit, I'm surprised this album got the top pick. Sure, it was a narrow three-way race, but I had expected the support behind those two records. After all, Kamasi Washington's The Epic had won a ton of critical acclaim as a behemoth of modern jazz, and Love Stuff by Elle King probably got the request thanks to how many people went back to rediscover her after 'Ex's And Oh's'. This guy, on the other hand...

Okay, from what I can glean, Garrett Borns is a Michigan-based singer-songwriter that's had some success on the rock and alternative charts after getting signed to Interscope. Apparently much of his work was inspired by retro-cool Americana, like the Beach Boys and Playboy magazines from the 60s and 70s. That's got some promise, and his collaborating producers also seemed interesting, most notably Tommy English, a guy who has worked for both 5 Seconds Of Summer and Black Veil Brides... and yet buzz was suggesting BØRNS was more retro-disco and glam rock. At the very least I like glam rock, and even though Kyle Craft set the genre an incredibly high bar this year with Dolls Of Highland, that's no reason why BØRNS couldn't also match six months earlier. And besides, you all recommended I take a look at this and I have to trust you guys have an idea of what I'd otherwise like, so how did Dopamine turn out?

video review: 'fma' by grace

I'm absolutely stunned this review has been received as well as it has - took me a while to get out properly, so I'm happy with the results, but still, I expected a bit of a backlash here that hasn't happened. Huh.

Next up is my 3-year anniversary and a very special video you all voted for, so stay tuned!

album review: 'fma' by grace

Oh, I've been looking forward to this review.

See, a few months back I covered a song as a World Hit for Billboard BREAKDOWN called 'You Don't Own Me', which was a remake of a classic Lesley Gore song from the mid-60s and was actually updated well for the modern era. And ever since then, with the song crossing over into the States, I've been trying to keep an eye on Grace Sewell, known mononymously as Grace. If you recognize that last name, it might be because her brother Conrad has also had some major world success as the vocalist on Kygo's 'Firestone' or his breakout solo hit 'Start Again', thus being the first pair of siblings to hit #1 on the Australian charts with different songs. 

And I'll have to admit I was intrigued - with 'You Don't Own Me' it looked like Grace was able to tap into the smoky side of vintage soul that leans more towards Amy Winehouse than Meghan Trainor, and the fact she brought on Quincy Jones himself to update the production is all the more evidence that she might be a formidable artist in her own right. And while some of that would come from being part of a family of musicians going back to her grandparents who toured with the Bee Gees, there did seem to be formidable talent here, so I checked out her debut FMA, which stands for Forgive My Attitude - what did we get?

video review: 'weval' by weval

Overall, pretty decent listen, I dug this. Not sure how much replay it has, but I did appreciate it.

Next up, Grace, Schoolboy Q, and that third year anniversary... what album did I get? Stay tuned to find out!

album review: 'weval' by weval

I always feel like I'm behind the times when I talk about electronic music.

And look, I'm trying to keep up, but it's only getting more and more tricky when it feels like for every electronic record I cover I end up missing five. Which is kind of weird because I don't tend to get a lot of requests for electronic music outside of the mainstream crossover stuff, but I'm still trying to dig into the genre and find more stuff I like, and if strip-mining Pitchfork's critically acclaimed section helps me get to the stuff that might pick up more traction, I'll take it.

So let's talk about a record that dropped a week or so back and seemingly fell under everyone's radar, the self-titled debut album from electronic duo Weval. A pair of Dutch friends, they don't really identify under any specific electronic music subgenre but from I was able to dredge up you could probably put them close to the spacier, more wiry side of deep house, or at least that was what I picked up when I took a look at their 2013 Half Age EP. It certainly isn't the most experimental electronic music I've ever heard, but there was a melodic consistency and chill sandy vibe that I quite enjoyed. So while I doubted this record might replace Jamie xx's In Colour as my go-to summer electronic album, I gave their self-titled debut a try - what did I find?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 16, 2016 (VIDEO)

This was... well, an interesting week to say the least. I genuinely hope we get a shakeup instead of a summer lull, because I don't have much patience for the rest of this. In the mean time, though, I've got Weval, then probably Grace and a few others coming soon, so stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - july 16, 2016

So here's the thing about the summer lull period with the charts: you get out of it basically what you put in. If you have good songs primed to go live in May or June that'll have some momentum, you'll basically have your summer lineup providing there's no big shakeup or surprises. But if you don't... well, basically you're left with most of the Hot 100 right now, which isn't so much outright awful but full of tracks that engender barely a reaction at all. Fellow music critic Todd In The Shadows described these tracks as fragments, but I'd prefer the term hollow: they fill time on the radio, but you're left feeling like nothing sticks in the way some years have, which is bad even for pop.

video review: 'what we live for' by american authors

Well, this happened. Overall a decent record, but I can't help feeling they could have done a fair bit more. Eh, it happens.

Next up... well, Billboard BREAKDOWN for one, but then I want to get to this Weval record, as well as Grace and maybe Bat For Lashes too... stay tuned!

album review: 'what we live for' by american authors

So let's talk about surprises.

It's a sad fact of being a critic is that it's rare that you get surprised by an album. Sure, sometimes you'll get something insane coming out of the woodwork that blows your mind - which is why critics tend to shower praise on oddball records that are unlike anything they've ever heard before, and I'll admit I can succumb to this as well. But more often than not, it can be tough to go into every single record with the expectation that every album is someone's first, to try and capture that emotion of genuine awe.

And that's probably why I've got a fond spot in my heart for American Authors, something that'll probably surprise most of you if you only remember them for their sort-of hit 'Best Day Of My Life' that rapidly became a commercial product more than an actual song. And from that single it was widely thought that they were just another soulless rip-off of Imagine Dragons before that band fell off the deep end. Hell, that's what I expected when I covered their debut album Oh, What A Life - and it wasn't anything close to what I got. They were far closer to the power pop of acts like Semisonic or Fountains Of Wayne, just pressed through modern genre sounds of the time. It all lead to a weirdly likable record that didn't quite manage to work all the way through, mostly courtesy of some by-the-numbers songwriting and a frustrating inability for anyone to know what they were doing behind the production boards, but was still better than most would expect. And thus I had an interest in digging into their sophomore follow-up, which promised to continue and expand upon many of the same sounds - and hell, it's been a while since anyone cared about Imagine Dragons, so maybe American Authors might sound more fresh. So how did What We Live For turn out?

video review: 'freetown sound' by blood orange

I'm genuinely curious to see how fans of this guy respond to this review. I'm expecting it to be inflammatory, but hey, who knows. In the mean time, the lead-up to the third year anniversary has begun, so get your votes in!

Beyond that, Billboard BREAKDOWN, Weval, and American Authors coming up soon, so stay tuned!

album review: 'freetown sound' by blood orange

Let's talk about sex.

Specifically, what one would consider 'sexy' within the context of music - and unsurprisingly, there's a range when it comes to this sort of thing - what one person might consider sexy or racy or even kinky another might tedious or overdone or even offensive. And of course such ideas tend to evolve over time, but if you want to flip to an instantly recognizable period where 'sexy' music was dominant, an easy place to start would be 80s pop and R&B. This was the era of Prince and Madonna, artists testing the limits of explicit content and good taste, but doing it with enough sensuality and tightness to make some killer music out of it before most the 90s hammered much of it into a brick wall - I might like grunge, adult alternative, punk, and gangsta rap, but most of it wouldn't fall into what the popular conscious considers 'sexy music'.

As such, if you're on the fringe of R&B in the modern era, it tends to be an easy instrumental shorthand to call back to the 80s, which was the first big impression I got from Blood Orange, the stage name for Devonte Hynes. Now he's been around the indie scene for well over a decade, starting with a few indie folk records under the ridiculous name Lightspeed Champion, but in 2011 he'd reinvent himself into a smooth crooner trying to blend liquid indie guitar tones with the tight beats you'd remember from Prince. And yet I've never quite been impressed with him - instrumentally he gets most of the way there, even if I do think the tones aren't quite as tight as they could be, but Hynes himself never impressed me as a singer. Hate to say it but he's nowhere close to matching his instrumentation when it comes to personality, less Prince than El DeBarge or maybe even Eddie Murphy. And that's a problem when the writing isn't particularly interesting either, especially on that first album. So for his follow-up he called in all his indie connections for an even more lavish slice of 80s revival music on Cupid Deluxe... and yet somehow it was even worse. Maybe it's my fault for relistening to Prince after he passed away a few months ago and then coming to this expecting something with tightness or greater punch in the melodies to build to a real hook, or a vocal performance that can make any impact at all, or guest performances that remotely fit with this style of music, but this record fell incredibly flat for me. And yeah, I can appreciate the exploration of queer themes, but they sure as hell deserved better presentation than this - I might have issues when The Weeknd pulls from this era, but he at least can get the groove and atmosphere of this material a lot better.

But it didn't look like Blood Orange was done yet, so out of nowhere he dropped a surprise album called Freetown Sound, which in following the grand 80s tradition of R&B goes straight into politics. And immediately I had justifiable concerns - I can point to a string of bad political albums and songs out of the mid-to-late 80s and a lot fewer success stories - and also because of his guest stars to help define his black queer vision, he pulls on icons of that community like Carly Rae Jepsen, lead singer of Blonde Debbie Harry, and Nelly Furtado. Okay, yeah, that's not fair - he's worked with Carly Rae Jepsen before and he also got Zuri Marley, spoken word artist Ta-Nehisi Coates, slam poet Ashlee Hayes - but as someone who hasn't really liked the last two Blood Orange records or their attempts at sensuality, I didn't have high expectations here. But that means it can only get better, so what did we get with Freetown Sound?

the top albums/songs of the midyear - 2016 (VIDEO)

Well, this video was a ton of fun to make. Took me less time than I expected too, but it's always one of my favourites every year.

Next up... look, I've never had any interest in Blink-182, so I kind of want to cover the Weval record or Blood Orange... but we are coming up to my third year anniversary, and you all should remember what that means, so stay tuned!

the top albums/songs of the midyear - 2016

There will be a lot of headlines that suggest that 2016 has not been a good year for music - and if you follow the mainstream between the losses of several legends and a haphazard set of releases that slide between underwhelming and disappointing, that's easy to believe.

Of course, that view is not really reflective of reality, because if you look away from the Billboard Hot 100 - which I would advise, it's been a rough six months there - there is quality here. I think the big issue comes in that there have been fewer than normal outright smashes and instant classics as there were at the midyear of 2015, which was really frontloaded with incredible records. 2016 has been more scattershot, with a lot of great records that don't quite rise to the level of immediate classics, and also a fair bit more diverse. Country and folk, for one, have been a great year across subgenres, underground hip-hop has been pretty solid, and there's some great R&B, metal, and rock music that I've liked a fair bit. And that's before you get the genre-bending stuff that sticks the landing incredibly well, and I'd argue we've seen a lot of that thus far.

What this means is that it's been excruciating trying to narrow this down to my usual top twelve, in that the top half was very straightforward but the bottom half is a lot harder to cut. So while I almost chose to open things up to a top fifteen albums of the mid year, I figured I might as well stick with tradition and keep it at twelve, which meant some painful cuts - some of which I think will surprise you. So without further ado, let's start with...