Feather Ruffler

Can we ban months from ending in the middle of the week? You might say: “Arthur, September ended on a Friday and you were too lazy to put up your article. This is a terrible excuse.” To that I say… nothing. Because I didn’t put it up on Saturday or Sunday either. I waited until Monday evening. Whatever, here’s the music.

Big L – Lifestylez ov da Poor & Dangerous

Lamont “Big L” Coleman was an east-coast rapper who made his name on the scene by contributing to what’s now known as “horrorcore.” The genre is defined by hyperbolizing lyrics of violence and brutality. The lines between what lyrics were real and fantasy might not be so clear considering Big L was killed in a drive-by shooting where he was shot nine times in the face and chest.

Many of L’s lyrics describe varying degrees of violence which may have been horrifying to parents during the 1990s, but listening to them today it’s hard to take them seriously. L has a terrific, albeit morbid, sense of humor. His clever wordplay mixed with over-the-top brutality makes it easy to chuckle to a lot of his lines as long as you have a similar demented world view. For example, the track Danger Zone details L killing someone for threatening him:

“I jumped out the Lincoln, left him stinkin
Put his brains in the street
Now you can see what he was just thinkin”

Obviously seeing brain matter on a pavement doesn’t translate to a visual representation of what someone’s last thoughts were, but I’m imaging L killing a man and immediately coming up with that line on the spot. It’s comical to me. L’s songs are filled with these types of jokes. They’re not always morbid but they are mostly mean-spirited. Another song, All Black – which of course refers to forcing family members to dress in black for your funeral – contains the following lyric:

“If you want me to write you some raps G just ask me
Cause on the shelf is where your LP cold stood
Because it was no good, that shit ain’t even go wood”

“Go wood” of course referencing albums that go gold or platinum. In this case, someone offered a set of songs that were so bad they didn’t even make the fictional “wood” status. It’s funny stuff and more importantly ridiculous. All of the lyrics are so absurd that the brutality and violence is impossible to take seriously, even if at some moments it’s clear that some semblance of these stories were true for the real L’s life.

I appreciated my listen of Big L’s Lifestylez ov da Poor and Dangerous because it made me realize just how much I appreciate cleverness and lyricism in rap. There isn’t a lot of technical trickery going on, but I didn’t really need it. He’s a straightforward rapper who focuses on the fundamentals and they’re very strong.

4/5

Blur – Parklife

As a huge Gorillaz fan, I thought I would like this album a lot more. For those who don’t know, Gorillaz is a project primarily helmed by Blur’s frontman, Damon Albarn. Parklife was released in 1994, well before the fairly famous Song 2 (aka “Woohoo”) came out which is what most people know Blur for. Other than those two factoids, I didn’t know what to expect from Blur. It could’ve been a heavy alternative rock band, a weird electronic-based rap hybrid, or something completely different.

It turns out Blur is mostly a catchy pop rock band from Britain, which I feel completely describes this album. There are tracks that I find intensely listenable in the moment, but I can’t get past the underlying Britishness. Tracks like London Loves, Bank Holiday, or Magic America make it hard to forget the regionality of the band. In fact, listening to the title track Parklife ought to qualify people for a visa to the Queen’s country. It’s a fine album for the duration that it’s on, but I really can’t stand to hear it ever again.

2/5

Boris – Pink

Following-up on the shoegaze interest I took with Have a Nice Life’s Deathconsciousness, I looked up other shoegaze-inspired albums that were popular in the music community and stumbled on Pink. Boris’ sound is a lot more noise-rock and heavy metal than the other shoegaze music I’ve heard so far. They’re a “play at full volume” type of band. It took a while to be in the mood for Pink. Despite its mellower introduction track, the entire album is a balls-to-the-wall rager. Listening to the entire album once through, it’d be easy to say that every song sounds exactly the same. In reality, the first few tracks are simply lackluster compared to the back half where Boris’ sound starts to distinguish itself.

Electric is a short and sweet assault of instruments that I found myself starting my morning commute with. From there it was easy to let the album play until the end. Pseudo Bread does a nice job layering the noise with vocals and is probably the most approachable song. Afterburner is a meandering track which I imagined the band figured out how the song was going to sound as they played it. Six, Three Times is another quality track and you get My Machine as a palette cleanser before the 18 minute Just Abandoned Myself which mostly consists of droning guitars going on for way too long.

I was actually so pleased with how the second half of the album turned out that I looked into the deluxe edition of Pink which was released earlier this year. The second disc available in that version provides some similar tracks, which I’d recommend, but it seems Boris as a band is at no loss of content. They have over two dozen albums and have not slowed down since releasing Pink a decade ago (or one dozen albums ago). It is worth noting that Pink is currently out of print, but they’re offering an MP3 download through bandcamp of all places.

4/5

The Internet – Ego Death

There’s three categories I place albums in: Albums you immediately like, albums you immediately dislike and albums you’re not sure about. Unfortunately I’ve discovered that almost all albums I immediately like end up having a short lifespan. This was the case for The Internet’s Ego Death. I’ve long hoped for the day that Tyler the Creator would drop his fake enjoyment of rap and just release the full-on soul/jazz/funk album like he knows he wants too. When I discovered The Internet (which is also under Odd Future) I thought I had discovered my holy relic. I dumped some 30+ listens into this album over a week. I was riding a high and I was convinced it was my new favorite.

Today I can say that the groovy bass lines, Syd’s vocals and the vibe of the album are still something I’d take over 50 percent of the other crap I’ve listened to this year. But the spell has broken. Now I just hear the repetition of each track, the simplicity, how long “Girl is and completely overstays its welcome. I constantly hit the skip button because I burn out on every song in 30 seconds but never find one to settle with. It’s sugary music that’s feel good but much like a bowl of candy, you probably don’t want to eat it for the rest of your life. I’ll throw it in a party mix and show it to my friends, but man did it get old fast.

3/5

TV On the Radio – Dear Science

I actually forgot I listened to this album and it was only two weeks ago. I think I heard that “DLZ” track from Breaking Bad and thought “man, the rest of that album must be bomb.” Well, I listened to it a dozen times and can’t tell you a single thing about it. So I guess not. Shout Me Out was ok, I think?

2/5

I did a tally of all the albums I’ve covered so far. With only three months left I’ve listened to 40 albums as of today. Which means I’m on track to completing with 54 albums done. Of course, I listened to a great deal many more but didn’t write about them in any way. I’m thinking about those Panda Bear, Modest Mouse and Mollusk albums that were so terrible I couldn’t get through them. Maybe I’ll throw them on at the end of the year just to make my number seem bigger. Every inch counts, right?