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Slowthai: A sign of the times and evidence of a process of self-discovery
Photo:
Universal Music
Album of the week:
Slowthai - "Tyron"
When a pop artist releases an album under his or her own name, navel gazing is usually indicated - or a personally motivated change of style.
This was
true
, more than
on the nose,
for “Another Side of Bob Dylan” as well as for albums called “Whitney”, “Britney Jean” or “Janet”.
Now the British rap star Slowthai joins this tradition with his second album: Tyron Kaymone Frampton is the real name of the 26-year-old from Northampton, whose debut "Nothing Great About Britain" two years ago was not just a raw, angry Brexit -Soundtrack from the precariat, it was also one of the best British hip-hop albums of recent times.
The self-styled “Brexit bandit” was distributing at the time, calling ex-Prime Minister Theresa May a “dickhead” and holding a supposedly severed Boris Johnson plastic head during his performance at the award ceremony for the prestigious Mercury Music Prize for which he was nominated the height.
The appearance caused quite a stir.
At the beginning of 2020 he got caught up in an extremely suggestive dialogue with presenter and comedian Katherine Ryan at an award ceremony for the magazine “NME”, which was honored as “Hero of the year”.
After that, the white working class rapper was branded as misogynous and sexist on social media.
Heroes can fall that fast.
Everything between Ryan and Slowthai has now been cleared up, she didn't think it was that bad, he apologized.
But Frampton is still deranged.
"I hate the internet," he hisses at the end of his track "Play With Fire";
sometimes, he raps drunk, it feels like he's stuck his head in a blender.
The piece ends the first, more aggressive half of the album, which reproduces the brutal drive of "Nothing Great About Britain".
Andreas Borcholte's playlist
Photo:
Christian O. Bruch / laif
Slowthai: NHS
Audio88 & Yassin: WUP
Steiner & Madlaina: Cheers my darling
Claud: Jordan
Moli: Shapeshifting
Django Django: Glowing In The Dark
Louisahhh: Numb, Undone
Dry Cleaning: Strong Feelings
Elena Steri: Pavement
Taylor Swift: Love Story (Taylor's Version)
Go to Spotify playlist Right arrow Go to Apple Music playlist Right arrow
However, Slowthai no longer distributes as heavily as it used to, but licks its wounds.
in “Canceled” he evokes a bloodthirsty pack and vampires, but then leaves it to his successful rap colleague Skepta to blaspheme the thumbs-up-thumbs-down justice on Twitter and Co.: “How you gonna cancel me / Twenty awards on the mantelpiece «.
In “Mazza” (with feature guest A $ AP Rocky) he thinks about falling back into old, criminal behavior patterns that he wanted to have overcome through success: “Feel to revert to my old ways / Cricket tickets, wraps of cocaine / sticky fingers, shoplifters ".
The beats are good, the tracks have punch, but all that defensive self-pity is annoying in the long run.
Fortunately, things get more interesting in the second half of the album, when the guitars, piano tüdelü and choral singing not only get musically more pop and multi-layered, but also get down to business.
Tracks like “Focus” and “Terms” dig deep into the reflection of a youth in the “broken homes” of Great Britain, where Slowthai describes his loneliness, the shame of his life and his feeling of social marginalization;
a lasting kick in the hollow of the knee: "No-one I can lean on / So I'm limping with a walking stick".
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Slowthai
Tyron
Label: Polydor (Universal Music)
Label: Polydor (Universal Music)
approx. € 12.01
Price query time
02/12/2021 8:34 p.m.
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He finally comes close to Jay-Z's ghetto anthem “Hard Knock Life” in the album highlight “NHS”, in which he compares his insight that he has to accept the good as well as the bad in life with the often setbacks related efforts of the UK National Health Service in the fight against Corona.
For his soul, torn between self-hatred and self-assertion, he finds touching verses: "If you suck in your tummy, when you're starin 'at the mirror / In your eyes you kill the flicker, serial killer".
Fair enough
that this second album, which was created under adverse circumstances - after the shitstorm, in the middle of lockdown - has become a bit out of round: a sign of the times and a testimony to a process of self-discovery.
The socially alienated Tyron is also hidden in the Brexit punk Slowthai.
It's worth listening to both of them.
(7.6)
Listened briefly:
Steiner & Madlaina - "Wish me luck"
Even on their debut, the Swiss duo Nora Steiner and Madlaina Pollina nonchalantly balanced the vacillation between hedonism, resentment and fatalism of the millennials with hits like »The beautiful life«.
Now the indie hit sound has been greased, the lyrics have been politically salted.
"It hurts to be young," they sing in one of their catchy chansons.
Oh sweet pain
(7.8)
Audio88 & Yassin - »Death List«
The self-proclaimed "bad conscience" of German rap was gone too long.
The Berlin-based Audio88 and Yassin remind on their fifth album that, in addition to the pandemic, there is also a virulent Nazi problem in the country.
They turn the horror of right-wing "death lists" into a grim counter-offensive, including an unscrupulous dive into Alice Weidel's house.
Heijeijei.
But good.
(8.0)
Claud - "Super Monster"
You could take Claud Mintz from New York for an East Coast version of Billie Eilish: colorful hair, charmingly hungover singing, excellently produced, sometimes danceable dreampop songs about the melancholy attitude towards life of youth.
But on her debut, the first album on Phoebe Bridger's label, the 21-year-old student proves to be an accomplished indie songwriter with monster hooks.
Becomes big.
(7.9)
The Pretty Reckless - "Death By Rock And Roll"
Speaking of Billie Eilish: The Pretty Reckless probably pitched a hymn for the 25th Bond film, complete with a John Barry motif ("25").
All the better now on the fourth album of the rock band around ex-actress Taylor Momsen ("Gossip Girl"), who takes on the legacy of Soundgarden with a feminine rock'n'roll attitude ("And So It Went").
Soundwise 25 years too late, but hey.
(6.5)