No romantic songs this year in the lead up to Valentine’s Day? Where is the love???
THE BEST:
‘CANCELLED’ – Slowthai ft. Skepta
UK grime artists Slowthai and Skepta deliver this fiery
attack on cancel culture (I know that Slowthai got cancelled last year, but
when did Skepta get cancelled?). The track should probably read ‘Skepta ft.
Slowthai’ as he seems to dominate the track, however both rappers are sounding
equally fierce and the bass is so savage it will clear your bowels. The horror
theme to the video is also pretty cool.
‘KIM’ – Tkay Maidza ft. Yung Baby Tate
‘BITCH I’M BITCH I’M KIM’. This hook is utterly dumb, but I
don’t care – the Aussie artist’s latest banger has me addicted. Tkay’s rapping
is killer and the beat goes ridiculously hard (the last track I featured from Tkay
was a chilled-out bossa-nova flavoured pop song, so I was not expecting this!).
It’s also fun to see her and Yung Baby Tate dress up as various Kims in the
video. Sad to see there’s no love for Kim Jong Un.
‘Opus’ – Black Country, New Road
London experimental rock band Black Country, New Road just
dropped their debut album For The First Time and I cannot wait to give
it a listen. This suspenseful eight minute cut from the record may well be
their magnum ‘opus’. Instrumentally, it consists of eerie guitars and shofar-flavoured
trumpets that rise and fall like Swans playing at a Bar Mitzvah. Singer Isaac
Wood continues to sound like he’s on the edge of committing a school shooting,
closing the track by manically roaring ‘I guess I’m a little bit laaaate to
the paaaartyyyyyy’. It’s exhilaratingly terrifying.
‘What Is Next?’ – Lucy Francesca Dron
Brisbane artist Lucy Francesca Dron blends jazz-flavoured
vocal cadences and guitar chords with alt-rock-flavoured distortion and drums
on this exciting track ‘What is Next?’. It’s a combo that probably shouldn’t
work, and yet it does – Lucy’s competence as both a jazz singer and rock
guitarist result in a track that’s both graceful and gritty. The
singer/guitarist plans to drop an EP some time later this year.
‘dice’ – youngdumblovers
This track starts off unassumingly as a minimal moody UK rap
song. It then transitions unexpectedly into ethereal James-Blake-esque
electropop. The explosive indie rock guitars that come in towards the end serve
as an added extra twist, at which point I was well and truly won over – this track
is a total adventure. The members of this collective have been keeping their
identities a mystery. I’m excited to hear more from them – whoever they are.
THE WORST:
‘Elasticity’ - Serj Tankian
While I usually don’t mind Serj Tankian’s wacky delivery,
the vocals are so excessively cartoonish here that I actually found them to be
quite annoying. I’m also pretty peeved that System of a Down will no longer be reforming for another album.