Hip
hop fans have been sleeping on Denzel Curry so long that I’m surprised they
haven’t got bedsores at t his point. The fast-flowing Floridian rapper pretty
much fathered Soundcloud rap – although to put him in the same category as dumbed-down
goons like Lil Pump seems a bit of an insult. Denzel’s music is its own blend
of ingredients (his very own musical curry) – a mix of speedy flows, angry
delivery and half-trip/half-trap beats.
2016’s
Imperial, an album of wall-to-wall bangers,
showed how fun Denzel could be. My only gripe with this record was that it lacked
dynamics, with the energy seemingly jammed in sixth gear. Denzel Curry clearly must
have read my review, because if there’s one big change on this album, it’s the newfound
dynamics.
Taboo
(stylised TA13OO) is divided into
three acts – Light, Grey and Dark. The ‘Light’ section opens the album with
Denzel showing off his crooning skills (yes, this man can now sing), carrying a
tone similar to Andre 3000 over a selection of lush and soulful beats. This is
followed by the ‘Grey’ act, which is largely trap anthems. It then ends with
the ‘Dark’ section, which borders on screamo rap with its aggressive closer ‘Black
Metal Terrorist’ in which Denzel attempts to finish off the listener in a
Mortal Kombat fashion.
The
light/grey/dark theme doesn’t completely make sense – lyrically, there’s not
much lightness on any of the tracks. Even the first act delves deep into
depression (although the lyrics certainly get more unhinged, with Denzel
contemplating terrorism by the end). I’m also unsure why aggressive banger ‘Sumo’
ended up on the light section, nor do I understand why ‘Vengeance’ takes a smooth jazzy turn despite being on the dark section.
Thematic
discrepancies aside though, the individual tracks themselves on TA13OO are Denzel’s best so far – so much
so that I’m willing to overlook the theme entirely. There are more hooks in
this tracklist than a fishing store – ‘Black Balloons’ hasn’t even finished and
I was already mouthing the words ‘let it
flow, let it flow, let it flow by me’. As for Denzel’s delivery, this is
where the newfound sense of dynamics really makes an appearance. Whilst he
still throws out his hyperspeed flows on occasion, most of tracks see him
reigning it in so that he can vary up the pace. ‘Switch It Up’ is the perfect
example of this, in which he jumps over the 808s like an acrobat, switching his
flow up (hence the title) from bar to bar.
Lyrically,
Denzel is also on top form and equally diverse. When he’s not pulling out fun
and esoteric pop culture references to anime characters and wrestlers on tracks
like ‘Sumo’, the rapper is confronting more serious issues such as suicide on ‘Clout
Cobain’. This latter track is a fresh take on the pressures of fame – the shocking music video gives the track most of its power, but the song itself is still innovative.
Even token anti-Trump track ‘Sirens’ isn’t all that bad, featuring a guest
verse from J.I.D (who I keep meaning to check out more from) and a great line
about how one narrow-minded white person can make a black community insular: ‘with a good girl gone bad girl/ who went gay
cause of date rape/ that’s a metaphor for the US/ cause they got us in the same
state’.
Denzel
may not possess the poetry of a rapper like Kendrick, but he’s still got a flow
and energy to rival these artists. It’s about time that he started to get
recognition - already this album is converting new fans and making him the
household name in hip hop that he deserves. I’ll agree that the light/grey/dark
theme isn’t entirely watertight, but this doesn’t really matter to me given
that the songs themselves are some of the most well-rounded and catchy rap
songs to drop this year.
★★★★★
TRACK TASTER: