Migos - Culture II (Quality Control/Motown/Capitol, 2018)

Migos' follow up to Culture isn't so much an album (or a double album) as much as it's a collection of songs. In the streaming era though, this is what passes for an album. Which isn't to speak negatively of it - there's a lot of good here, although it could have been hacked down into one really tight album realistically. Migos are almost like shapeshifters though. Any song can be a Migos track. Or, Migos can make any song a Migos track. Does that make sense? It's impressive at how quickly they churn these out and there's some quality here for sure - "Walk It Talk It" is already drilled into our brains not to mention "Stir Fry", "MotorSport", "Notice Me", "White Sand" - even the intro ("Higher We Go") is radio ready. Migos are a well oiled machine at this point and they do what they do well.

Comments

Sunburned Hand of the Man - Get Wet with the Animal (Manhand, 2018)

I keep up with Sunburned only intermittently these days, they seem to be taking a more rock-ist approach lately. Like this one. Each track is about 4-5 minutes of pretty ramshackle, jammy, funky, boogie rock...almost spoiled by the throaty, beery vocals shouted over the top of each one of these tunes with nonsensical platitudes. I almost shut it off after a couple tracks but I stuck it out and kinda came around on some level. I was oddly reminded of My War era Black Flag sludge punk. The band sez "these Holy Grail fueled recordings are a mix of iphone and zoom recordings run through garageband, reaper and some plug-ins. We're still working on the much more listener-friendly Black Dirt session..." and point taken, listener friendly this ain't.

Nachtmystium/Leviathan - In the Valley of Death, Where Black Metal is King: An Homage to the Roots (Ascension Monuments Media, 2018)

What the fuck is that title. Okay I get the first part is a Judas Iscariot tribute, but did we really need "an homage to the roots" in there? Hey wouldn't it be funny if these were actually covers of the band The Roots? Anyway. This album was supposed to come out 10 years ago, but it was blocked by the bands' respective labels. Now I guess they've figured out a way, or Blake Judd needs money for drugs so he's figured out a way, to put this out. The Bandcamp version has 8 tracks, 5 from Nachtmystium and 3 from Leviathan, but I've seen a 10-track tracklisting elsewhere. On the version I have, we have Nachtmystium covering Judas Iscariot, Ildjarn (twice), Von and Burzum. Leviathan tackles Ildjarn (twice) and Von once. I seem to be missing Leviathan's Judas Iscariot cover ("Where the Winter Beats Incessant") and one of Nachtmystium's Von covers ("Von"). Weird. Wonder if there were some licensing issues or something. All four Ildjar...

Kamal Keila - Muslims and Christians (Habibi Funk, 2018)

Pretty cool album compiling two long-lost tapes of a long-lost Sudanese musician Kamal Keila and his band. The songs are sung in both English and Arabic and the backing band is lightly jazzy, punchy, RnB...talented for sure. Not the most far-out interesting thing Habibi Funk has ever put out but nice.

Tips Zum Selbstmord

Search This Blog