Music Review Roundup – January and February 2014

Kid Cudi – Satellite Flight: The Journey to Mother Moon

Review: Satellite Flight was originally intended to be an EP, building anticipation for Kid Cudi’s return to his successful Man on the Moon album series. It probably would have worked better if it had stayed an EP. As it is, the album basically just sounds like a typical Kid Cudi release, which was interesting and fresh when Cudi first came on the scene (in 2008), but now it just feels boring and stale. We have already heard these types of tracks from him before, and they were better too. Cudi is still an extremely talented artists and there are some fantastic moments (especially from his production soundscapes, which he shares with Dot Da Genius on three tracks), but all in all it is pretty disappointing. It might be time for Cudi to start working with new collaborating producers again to help grow his sound. 2/5 Available for download here

ScHoolboy Q – Oxymoron

Review: The black hippy MC, ScHoolboy Q, has dropped an early contender for hip hop album of the year. Lyrically, Q is very conflicted about his place in the world. He is a budding rap superstar, but still feels connected to the streets – which can be very much heard in the sound of the album – and he still wants to engage in the party lifestyle, but he is a father now. It is definitely worth checking out for hip hop fans. 4/5 Available for download here

Broken Bells – After the Disco

Review: James Mercer and Brian Burton (Danger Mouse) are back with another collaboration (or as some might say, a new The Shins’ album but with Danger Mouse producing and co-writing). After the Disco is a very catchy pop rock album that almost feels too tight and clean (maybe a byproduct of Mercer and Burton being great musicians). There is not much raw energy, leaving it feeling a bit stagnant, but at the same time the songs are all pretty great and infectious. Fans of The Shins will definitely find something to like here with After the Disco. 3/5 Available for download here

Dum Dum Girls – Too True

Review: Too True is the third album from this LA band. While lead singer Dee Dee’s emotive singing is still utterly compelling, the songs on Too True suffer from rather bland production. They seem to drift into the background, not demanding for the listener’s full attention. There is nothing wrong with that style of passive music, but it feels like a letdown given the groups usual striking raw quality that begs for attention. 3/5 Available for download here

St. Vincent – St. Vincent

Review: Annie Clark is again in fantastic form on her fourth solo album, working with for the third time with producer John Congleton. St. Vincent (the album) feels almost like a concept album as it focuses on themes of what it means to be a person in the digital age, an age in which we create the role of ourselves (or who we hope we will be) and then promote that role to the world digitally. Musically, this set of songs is Clark’s most ambitious. They are funky and accessible, yet still have a definite fringe aesthetic. It is the best album so far this year. 4/5 Available for download here

Warpaint – Warpaint

Review: Warpaint also hails from Los Angeles. There self-titled second album is a haunting, brooding experience of beautifully harmonized vocals that feels all consuming, and maybe even devastating if you let yourself be completely taken away. It oozes with atmosphere that may not immediately grab you; but once it does, it pulls you in and devours you – sirens calling you into the rocks. 4/5 Available for download here

Big Sean – Hall of Fame (2013) – Review

Review: Big Sean is a talented but polarizing MC due to his delivery. For his fans, he is a skilled and funny lyrist, but for others he is nothing more than a punch line rapper whose voice sounds too poppy.

With Hall of Fame, Big Sean’s second studio release, he tries to both give his fans want they want, while still making an album that is relevant in today’s hip hop market. To that end, the album succeeds. It is a stronger release than Finally Famous (but only marginally). More than the body of work here, Sean seems to have grown as an artist and lyrist. He spends a large portion of this album actually telling stories and speaking about who he is and where he comes from in a much more inviting manner. The album feels personal and not just generic punch lines and stunting.

Musically, Big Sean has good chemistry with producers No ID and Key Wane, who handle most of the album’s production. While there are not really any standout tracks that just pop, overall Hall of Fame is good sonically. The beats fit Sean’s style. In terms of featured guests, the album has an okay mix, highlighted by NaS and Kid Cudi, but really most of the guesses add nothing. Sadly, what could have been the album’s best track with wonderful guests – Control featuring Kendrick Lamar and Jay Electronic – did not make the cut due to licensing issues.

While Hall of Fame is probably not going to win Big Sean any new fans, it is a good pop hip hop album that is worth checking out for those who like the GOOD Music brand. 3/5

Essential Tracks:

1)      Guap – Produced by Key Wane and Young Chop

2)      10 2 10 – Produced by No ID

3)      First Chain – Produced by No ID and Key Wane, featuring NaS and Kid Cudi

Available on: Digital Download

Kanye West – Yeezus (2013) – Review

Review: Kanye West is a leader of artistic creativity in hip hop, often drastically altering the direction of the genre with each release. His sixth album, Yeezus, is no different. Following the trend of his last two lustrous records, 808s & Heartbreak and My Dark Twisted Fantasy, West again transforms his sound and tests the limits of the genre (and popular music).

Rejecting the commercial corporate process by which music is put out, West promoted the album with guerrilla video projections of his song New Slaves across the world. He did not release any singles or music videos. The album artwork is almost non-existent (see above). But, all this plays into West’s attitude on Yeezus. He is fed up with the whole structure behind corporate run popular music. He does not want to make bland generic music like everyone else. It wants to challenge everything and reach for new aesthetic heights.

Yeezus does not sound like anything else in hip hop. It is a minimalist amalgamation of punk, new wave, dance hall, electronic, and hip hop all smashed together. It feels raw, and yet still features immaculate production. West has always been a great collaborator, and here he brings in veterans like Daft Punk and (frequent producing partner) Mike Dean as well as fresh artists like Arca and TNGHT. Rick Rubin served as the co-executive producer with West to get the overall sound just right. Sonically, the album is intense, vibrant, aggressive, and utterly compelling. West maintains his position ahead of the genre while everyone else lags behind perpetually trying to catch up. Musically alone, this is a magnificent album.

Lyrically, West again plays on similar themes to his last two albums. He is self-aggrandized and seems to have a guarded mistress of women, but his boasts come from a thinly veiled frail insecure place of sadness and doubt. He turns to fleeting moments of pleasure to escape the darkness that clouds his thoughts, stemming from failed relationships and racial inequality that West sees around him. West has no desire to make a commercially accessible album, and he blatantly attacks the establishment. He wants to air out his distrust and misgivings to instigate emotion in the listener and he also lets the listener into his soul to engage them emotionally as well. That is the appeal of West. He is not afraid to put it all out there, to connect with his fans on a deeper level.

West is at a place in which he could bring in any artist for a feature, but unlike My Dark Twisted Fantasy, Yeezus is very much from a singular voice (being West’s). Frank Ocean, Justin Vernon, Kid Cudi, Tony Williams, and Charlie Wilson show up to add supporting vocals, while Chief Keef and Travi$ Scott also bring some punch to the album. But only relatively unknown Chicago MC King L has a verse outside of West. In this way, West pays tribute to his city and troubled, gang-violent South Side neighborhood by including leading local voices Chief Keef and King L (because he can). It works well because West has essentially challenged what is possible sonically in hip hop. To have a bunch of recognizable voices clouding up the album would have diminished the overall power and freshness of the album.

Like each Kanye West album, Yeezus changes the game. It is vital, raw, incredibly ambitions, and just simply a work of an aesthetically brilliant artist (who knows the perfect collaborators to bring together to find the right sound). It is safe to say that this is one of the best and important albums of 2013, a must. 5/5  

Essential Tracks:

1)      New Slaves – Produced by Kanye West

2)      Bound 2 – Produced by Kanye West

3)      Black Skinhead – Produced by Kanye West and Daft Punk

Available on: Digital Download

Kid Cudi – Indicud (2013) – Review

Review: Indicud is Kid Cudi’s third album (unless you also count his WZRD collaboration with Dot da Genius), and the first outside his Man on the Moon Trilogy (the final chapter due next year).

While Mescudi sticks to his familiar lyrical themes – isolation, drug use, depression, yet with a sense of confidence – with Indicud he tackles all the production (though Hit-Boy does co-produce Red Eye). This is both something that works really well about the album and one of its main issues. Mescudi has always had a very specific and unique sound for his albums (like a darker version of EDM), but it is his collaboration with producers such as Emile, Dot da Genius, Ratatat, Plain Pat, Jeff Bhasker, and Kanye West that helped shape a full cohesive sound (and is really a big part of the brilliance of his first two albums). On Indicud there is a very uniform tone and feel, which comes from Kid Cudi being the sole creative force behind the beats, but this also kind of hurts the album as it drifts into a repetitive (if not boring) zone during the weaker songs. His production varies from track to track. Sometimes it is good to great: Unfuckwittable, Just What I Am, Young Lady (which has a fantastic hook), Immortal, Girls (though, I am not a big fan of Too $hort’s misogynistic-feeling verse), Red Eye, Brothers, Cold Blooded, and Afterwards. While on others, his beats just feel too bland. He is missing the collaborative spark of working with other producers.

The album has a number of strong featured guests: Kendrick Lamar, Haim, RZA, A$AP Rocky, and Michael Bolton all add something to their respective tracks. King Chip is on three tracks, but he never stands out. Michael Bolton’s feature in particular seems to come out of nowhere and feels a bit off when his voice first appears on Afterwards, but then it completely takes over the whole track and is the most memorial aspect on the song. RZA and Kendrick Lamar elevate their tracks considerably, while Haim makes for a great (if not seemingly random) collaboration.

I am torn about Indicud. I like it (that said, though, I would say it is not as strong as Man on the Moon: The End of Day or Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager), and more specifically I like a lot of the tracks, features, and the general vibe of the album. But, it also feels a little tedious to listen to all the way through, which stems from Kid Cudi not quite having enough good beats to fill fifteen tracks and three interludes.

Kid Cuid fans will enjoy the LP, and the good elements on the album get better with time. But again, it is just a step below his past work (but better than WZRD). 3/5

Essential Tracks:

1)      Brothers – Produced by Kid Cudi, featuring King Chip and A$AP Rocky

2)      Immortal – Produced by Kid Cudi

3)      Just What I Am – Produced by Kid Cudi, featuring King Chip

Available for download: Here

G.O.O.D. Music – Cruel Summer (2012) – Review

 Review: Kanye West is one of the best know hip hop/pop stars right now – we all know that. He is also one of the great auteurs of modern music, setting the standard for hip hop and determining the next direction the genre will take. Thus, anything he puts out has high expectations (only to be even more hyper-inflated with the brilliance of his recent releases My Dark Twisted Fantasy and Watch the Throne – or, really his whole discography). Posse albums are never that great. Recently, we have been treated to a forgettable YMCMB album and two decent MMG albums. Even so, we all expected that Kanye West’s G.O.O.D. Music posse album would be different and incredible. Sadly, it is not incredible, but it is still really good and miles ahead of any other posse album.

So what works? Cruel Summer is for the most part musically excellent. Kanye West’s production team: Hit-Boy, Mike Dean, Jeff Bhasker, Hudson Mohawke, Travi$ Scott, Anthony Kilhoffer, Pop Wansel, and others deliver lush and beautifully produced music, that like much of West’s work has a unique and ambitious sound. It is the best part of the album (and Hit-Boy is probably the real breakout star of the album with great beats on the tracks Clique, Cold and Higher). West himself also has a hand in the production of almost every track (and re-remastered the iTunes release again delaying its arrival). Creatively, the album showcases West’s musical talent. The G.O.O.D. Music crew (Pusha T, Big Sean, Cyhi The Prynce, KiD CuDi, Common, D’banj, John Legend, Malik Yusef, and Teyana Taylor) all have their moments to shine and all provide good work. I would have liked to have seen Q-Tip and Yasiin Bey on there too though (and Mr. Hudson). Maybe they will show up on the next one. The guests are good too (highlighted by Jay-Z, The-Dream, Ghostface Killah, R. Kelly, Raekwon, and Ma$e – 2 Chainz is also on three songs, but I do not get the hype behind him).

So what does not work as well? Lyrically, the album is good but not great, and not on par with the fantastic music. Most of it is just sort of generic pop/hip hop language (money, cars, fashion, women, and opulence). Most of the best verses come from the guests (Jay-Z, Ghostface Killah and Ma$e – though West, Pusha T and Cyhi The Prynce drop some good stuff as well). This is really more of a minor complaint though. The two biggest issues are that the album has a lame ending (with its worst song closing the album) when it should have been something grander and (like with all posse albums) the album does not have a clear voice throughout. The first issue could have been fixed. Even if you just consider Don’t Like a bonus track, Bliss is not a great ending track either (though I do like it). Creepers and Bliss are both good middle of the album type tracks, but with them at the end, it gives the album sort of an underwhelming feeling as it closes (especially with Don’t Like which probably was better left off as just a G.O.O.D. Fridays release). The second is a lot harder to address, as the point of this album is for West to showcase the artists under his label, and thus it is going to have a lot of different competing voices.

Overall, I really like the album. Musically, it is just magnificent and wins me over with each listen. In addition to my ‘Essential Tracks’ I also highly regard To the World, Clique, The Morning, Sin City, and The One. Fans of My Dark Twisted Fantasy and Watch the Throne are going to like this album. 4/5

Essential Tracks:

1)      New God Glow – Kanye West & Pusha T, featuring Ghostface Killah, produced by Kanye West, Boogz & Tapez and Anthony Kilhoffer

2)      Cold – Kanye West, produced by Hit-Boy

3)      Higher – Pusha T, featuring The-Dream, Ma$e and Cocaine 80s, produced by Hit-Boy, Kanye West and Mike Dean

Available on iTunes (best version), CD and Amazon MP3

WZRD – WZRD (2012) – Review

WZRD – WZRD

Kid Cudi and Dot da Genius (the duo behind Cudi’s first big hit Day ‘N’ Night) form the experimental rock/pop group WZRD. While personally I enjoy Kid Cudi’s hip hop albums more, WZRD features some great tracks, some good ones and a couple that do not work that well. After Nirvana’s brilliant cover of Lead Belly’s Where Did You Sleep Last Night?, I thought no one would ever take a shot at that song again. Cudi shows no fear (as a Nirvana fan himself) with his cover. It is straight-forward and decent, but really does not add much to the song. The sound of the album may be different and new for Cudi and his fans, but really it is nothing new to what I call post-rock (stuff like art rock/pop and the more indie sound and chill wave music of the last few years – a less upbeat Sleigh Bells might be a good comparable to this album). The production is done entirely by Cudi and Dot da Genius, but feels maybe too simple and not polished enough in some places, while in others it is quite good. There is certainly a lot of potential for this project should Cudi and Dot da Genius make another album. Fans of art-pop, chill wave and indie rock will probably find things they like with WZRD and Cudi’s hip hop fans will too. It is a good album overall, but still feels in its infancy of its potential. 3/5

Editor’s Essential Tracks:

1)      Teleport 2 Me, Jamie – Produced by Kid Cudi and Dot da Genius, featuring Desire

2)      Efflictim – Produced by Kid Cudi and Dot da Genius

3)      The Dream Time Machine – Produced by Kid Cudi and Dot da Genius, featuring Empire of the Sun

Available on CD and Digital Download

Wale – Ambition (2011) – Review

Wale – Ambition

After his critically acclaimed but commercial failure debut Attention Deficit (one of my favorite hip hop albums of 2009), Wale needed a change. It came in the form of teaming up with Rick Ross on his label Maybach Music Group, garnering singles such as 600 Benz (off their label album Self Made Vol. 1). Many fans thought that he was going to sellout and change his style to be more commercial. But the only thing that has changed from Attention Deficit is the beats Wale is rapping over. The lyrical style and content are the same. He has such energy and an infectious lyricism that it is hard to dispute Wale as one of the best right now. No one else sounds quite like him. And for a large portion, his sound has not really changed much either – songs like: Lotus Flower Bomb, Sabotage and Miami Nights could easily be off any of his former releases. If anything, I like that he is incorporating new beats into his style and trying to grow as an artist. I mean is it not the goal to reach as many listeners as possible while maintaining your lyrical integrity, because that is what Wale has done with Ambition. I think he has a great chemistry with producers Tone P and Mark Henry, who both have multiple tracks on the album. But, he also has completely different beats too like Diplo’s Slight Work and beats that fit the popular trend right now, specifically from T-Minus. While it is as good an album as Attention Deficit, it is one of the better hip hop albums of 2011 and I look forward to more form Wale. 4/5

Editor’s Song Picks:

1)      Focused – Produced by Kore, featuring KiD CuDi

2)      Double M Genius – Produced by Mark Henry

3)      Ambition – Produced by T-Minus, featuring Meek Mill and Rick Ross

Available on CD and Digital Download

KiD CuDi – Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager (2010) – Review

Kid Cudi’s music is all about ambiance. He has a distinctive sound – elements of multiple genres’ darkest places combined to create a depressive self-reflexive yet fun style. Often, the tone and mood of his songs are what makes them work so well – the lyrics really could be anything – it is more about how he raps or sings his words and how they mix with the backing samples and beats that makes his sound so unique and interesting. But, the lyrics fit too, adding another layer. Kid Cudi’s music is specific to its intended audience, yet has enough commercial appeal to branch out. For those that love his sound, his new album will not disappoint.

Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager builds upon Kid Cudi’s first effort taking it to a darker place. The lyrical and sonic content of the album is rife with tales of excess and depression. The pressures of being a star weigh heavily on his mind and only encourage his destructive behaviors. While Man on the Moon: End of Day had some up moments (thinking of Enter Galactic and Up Up & Away), this album is bogged down under its own style and atmosphere – and yet, the album works quite well. Kid Cudi is monotone for most of the album; often his voice is secondary to the overall sonic experience, as if just another part to the track and not the focus as with most artists.

However, despite the album having a very particular and intended sound throughout, there are parts that do differ enough to signify the changing of the narrative. Kid Cudi has designed his album to not merely be a collection of his newest tracks, like most contemporary hip hop artists; rather his album does tell a story with clear changes in tone, but still within the overall style of the whole piece.  It starts off a bit with the illusion of fame and then cascades into the realities. From there the music moves onto a blended reality of the up of always being in (or apart of) a party and the down of being discounted, only to plunge into complete disarray. It ends with a realization: the pain and torment of life is a product often of our own creation and thus giving way for the healing process.

The production on the album is fantastic (from Emile, Plain Pat, Dot da Genius, Chuck Inglish, Jim Jonsin, Anthony Kilhoffer, and Blended Babies). Emile and Plain Pat craft the album’s best music and their work perfectly matches Kid Cudi’s vocal and stylistic strengths. The album also features guest appearances from Cee-Lo Green, Mary J. Blige, Kanye West, Cage, St. Vincent, GLC, Chip tha Ripper, and Nicole Wray. Cee-Lo Green, Mary J. Blige and Kanye West do provide memorable work, but really Kid Cudi is the star and the album would be just as good with no featured artists.

The best parts of the album (aka my favorite songs) are: Scott Mescudi vs. the World (featuring Cee-Lo Green), We Aite (Wake Your Mind Up), Marijuana, Erase Me (featuring Kanye West), and All Along. The first song serves a perfect introduction to the album, narrative and Kid Cudi as your narrator – enhanced by Cee-Lo’s great hook. We Aite and Maijuana show off the album’s outstanding production. Erase Me (the album’s only single) certainly seems to have the most commercial appeal being a pop anthem of sorts. All Along is maybe the saddest moment on the album and Kid Cudi’s singing style, lyrics and beat mix perfectly creating an emotional crescendo.

Man on the Moon II: The Legend of Mr. Rager is a good and fitting follow-up to Kid Cudi’s first album, expands on his distinctive style and reminds everyone that he is one of the best new artists around. 4/5

Available for digital download and on CD at Amazon.com