Kendrick Lamar
To Pimp A Butterfly Album Review
Top Dawg/Aftermath/Interscope Records
Released March 16th, 2015
Genre: Conscious Hip-Hop, Jazz Rap, Funk,
https://open.spotify.com/album/7ycBtnsMtyVbbwTfJwRjSP
Rap has become a culture that has a very distinct divide between fans. There are fans of the genre that only like boom-bap style beats, thick New York accents and songs about fake MCs. Others want newer-sounding, more electronically affected music. Kendrick Lamar is one of those rappers...
Father John Misty I Love You, Honeybear Album Review Sub Pop Records Released February 10, 2015 Genre: Indie Folk, Psychedelic Folk, Art Folk, Indie Rock
Father John Misty is in love. Madly in love. But promotional performances for Father John Misty, aka Josh Tillman’s, sophomore album I Love You, Honeybear tell a different story. When the Fleet Foxes ex-drummer appeared...
In a makeshift backstage area in the Off The Record record shop, which resembled a storage closet, Jordan, singer and shredder for West Virginia’s Rozwell Kid, sinks into a chair. “It was a very short trip ,” Jordan says, thankful for a drive that was shorter than a 24-hour drive from South By Southwest to work in West Virginia....
D’Angelo & The Vanguard
Black Messiah Album Review
RCA Records
Released December 15, 2014
Genre: R&B, Noise Funk, Funk Rock, Neo Soul, Psychedelic Soul, Country Funk (?)
D’Angelo is an enigma. As one of the most innovative and widely praised artists of his time, D’Angelo is oddly reclusive- always absent from the public eye. So it came as a HUGE surprise when Black Messiah dropped...
Mark Ronson
Uptown Special Album Review
Columbia Records
Released January 13, 2015
Genre: Funk, R&B, Pop, 70s soul revival
When “Uptown Funk” first infiltrated the airwaves, I was surprised for two main reasons: first at how catchy, upbeat, and groovy the track was, and second at how absolutely no one had even heard of Mark Ronson before then. Ronson’s work has been prominently overlooked...
Title Fight Hyperview Album Review (Click here to stream) ANTI- Records Released February 3, 2015 Genre: Indie Rock, Shoegaze, Punk (not too much) Progression can be a great or terrible thing. For Title Fight on their third LP Hyperview, progression is a step sideways.
The transition from melodic punk to dreamier-sounding territory has been noted throughout the band’s recent output (Floral Green...
Joey Bada$$
B4.DA.$$ Album Review
Cinematic Music Group
Released January 20, 2015
Genre: Rap, Boom Bap
Let’s just get this out of the way: this is good. This is really good. This is rapper Joey Bada$$’s most consistent release to date, and represents the young spitter’s ability to grow exponentially skill-wise in the future. All previous mixtapes and singles aside, Joey Bada$$ drops one of the...
Henry Steinway is an LA based producer known under the pseudonyms Clockwork, his electro house project, and RL Grime, a persona more focused on hip hop and trap music as shown in his album VOID, the first full length album under either alias. RL Grime first started to gain popularity with his remix of "Mercy" by Kanye West and singles...
