@@@ Billie Eilish: bury a friend (Interscope, 2019) Another pre-release tune from this record which may not ever be released. It’s gonna be all released pre released! This is a minimalist funk tune with dark themes. Bury the hatchet, bury a friend. But it’s all funky and accessible. It has a manicured and minimalist arrangement. I didn’t know the Billie Eilish story until now — she’s an 18 year old actress that’s getting a huge push, at least on the Apple Music. I’ve listening to a couple of other pre-release tracks as I cruise around the interwebz and the interesting part of the record lies in the sounds. Very slick and dynamic within the tunes. However I find the lyrics to be less than convincing. I think it’s supposed to be a serious record but the cutting edge sounds detract from the darkness of the record which is supposed to be about a nightmare or a dream or both. To my ear, it’s pretty standard corporate music business. Hinting at something dark without being able to render it honestly.
@@@ Top Notch: Ghetto Life (N/A, 2019) A solo record from a Brooklyn hip hop collective. I got to it via a promo email. The sounds are retro ’90s NYC hip hop a la Busta Rhymes and the main sonic theme is the Jamaican dancehall rhymes over hip hop arrangements. There are also prominent Wu Tang clan elements here with some tracks featuring multiple MCs.
@@@ Ninth Wave: Half Pure (Distiller, 2019) I got to this Scottish band’s track via a music publicist email. It’s a dramatical, post-goth ditty rooted in ’80s synth rock a la the Cure. Male singer singing ‘you’re only half pure, cuz the pain and the glamour that you were bred for’ is a pretty clever line but they wear it out.
YTD recordings listened to: 63
Good music, not list worthy: 35
Not good music: 25
Best: 0
Honorable Mentions: 0
Possibles: Retox, Defeater, Jonwayne, Okkyung Lee, Slidhr, The Chewers, Susie Iberra/Roberto Rodriguez, The Coral, T.O.M.B., Lozen, Erase Errata, Mastery, Hartley C. White, Weed, Cold Water, Luther Dickinson, Graeme Barrett, Fast Asleep, Goldlink, Cavanaugh, Satoko Fuji, Moken, Juan Atkins, Lantern, Twin Peaks, Djelimady Tounkara, The Oh Sees, Denny Zeitlin, MILF, Unfun, De La Soul, Carl Sagan’s Skate Shoes, A Tribe Called Quest, Noname, Klara Lewis, Krullur, The Lowest Form, Hard Proof, Yotoco, Jungle Fire, Sandoz, Oddisee, RAM, Fiver, Succumb Succumb, Gloom, Priests, Propaganda, This is the Kit, Roberto Gonzalez, Integrity, Tuba Skinny, The Expanders, Converge, Criolo, Billy Strings, Flowers of Sulphur, Portal, Lawaii, Etran De L’Air, Ruby Karinto, Elysia Crampton, Parquet Courts, Moskus, Kendl Winter, Tkay Maidza, Barro, Daniel Khan, Tallawit Timbouctou, Sumac, Tropical Fuck Storm, Harriet Tubman, Ammar 808