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Hip-hop collective Brockhampton
Album of the week:
Brockhampton - "Roadrunner: New Light, New Machine"
Do you remember Bruce Darnell?
As a »GNTM« coach, the super gay model choreographer once coined the immortal catwalk motto »Drama, Baby, Drama!« If Darnell were invited as a lifestyle consultant to the flat of the popular hip-hop boy band Brockhampton, you would like it very much , he would have to change his saying: There was already enough drama among the 13 young members of the multiethnic and LGBTQ + -open collective, especially in difficult childhoods with
broken homes
, drug stories, high school bullys, violence and rejection and depression, and later Weekly rounds of talks with actor, family friend and mentor Shia LaBeouf (of all people) and the painful expulsion of a member after allegations of sexual abuse: trauma, baby, trauma.
It couldn't be more zeitgeist.
Andreas Borcholte's playlist
Photo:
Christian O. Bruch / laif
Brockhampton: The Light
A1 x J1
: Latest trends
Nura
: On Fleek
Tkay Maizda
: Syrup
Mode selector
: Dentist
Schneider TM
: The 8 of Space
Damon Locks & Black Monument Ensemble
: The Body Is Electric (feat.Angel Bat Dawid)
Matthew E. White & Lonnie Holley
: I Cried Space Dust / Composition 12
Darkside
: The Limit
Cough: The fields shine far
Go to Spotify playlist Go to Apple Music playlist
The boys found each other in 2010 in a Kanye West fan forum through a call from the now 24-year-old rapper and singer Kevin Abstract from Texas, who initially formed the AliveSinceForever project from the numerous interested parties.
From 2014 he named the group Brockhampton after the street in Corpus Christi where he grew up.
Soon afterwards, the DIY band, which also includes graphic designers, producers and a photographer, caused a sensation with the self-chosen slogan "best boy band since One Direction" and from 2017 released a whole bunch of albums that could be summed up like this: Sad boys sing sweet pop and R&B songs about the search for self-acceptance, heartbreak and deep-seated feelings of melancholy and alienation.
Her biggest international hit two years ago was »Sugar«, for which a successful remix with pop singer Dua Lipa came out.
With “Roadrunner: New Light, New Machine” Brockhampton are now releasing the sixth excerpt from their ongoing therapy session after an unusually long break.
It should be the penultimate album before the band breakup recently announced by Abstract at the end of the year.
And that's a shame because it's also one of their most interesting so far.
This is mainly due to the new, hard old-school sound.
Kevin Abstract has apparently spent a lot of time in recent years with producer and Def Jam legend Rick Rubin, who was a fool of the band.
Apparently the long guru sessions also had an impact on the music, because the first tracks "Buzzcut" (with guest rapper Danny Brown) and "Chain On" (about the Black Experience and police violence against blacks) sound like very old, dryly rattling numbers from Run DMC or the early Beastie Boys.
Only in the solidarity hymns "Count On Me" and "I'll Take You On" do the familiar choir singing and the boy band feeling come back into play.
For the first time, Brockhampton are largely free of the claim to want to sound too cute or forgiving, in other words: generic, despite all the problem exegesis in the texts.
"What's The Occassion" and "The Light" play with Beatles motifs and heavier guitars from the indie-emo genre.
In “When I Ball” rapper Joba dealt with his father's suicide very touchingly.
A central piece is the Eminem-like »Windows«, which, after just under six minutes of rant about the threat from white incels, police, state, tyrants and capitalism, leads to a surprising »No Diggity« vibe from the nineties: the overloaded ones were disparate This collective has always been compositions, now something like complexity and depth is finally emerging from it.
The more or less subliminal tension of the album culminates in the beautifully nostalgic boom-bap party track “Don't Shoot Up The Party”, at the end of which a shot is actually fired, associations with the shoot in the LGBTQ + club “Pulse” in Orlando in 2016 should be intended.
“These white people don't love me”, it says in the bitter rap part: “Don't need you to love me / Fuck you, come fuck me / I know”.
It's about homophobia, racism, white, American self-hatred.
Where's the hope?
In the flawless Boyz II Men memory gospel »Dear Lord«, of course,
straight out of church
.
And in the second part of “The Light”, in the outro of which Kevin Abstract whispers to all suicidal tendencies of his young, sad fans with feverish optimism: “The light is worth the wait, I promise.
So baby please don't do it! «Just no drama, please!
(7.9)
Briefly listened to:
Damon Lock's Black Monument Ensemble - "Now (Forever Momentary Space)"
The "Black Nod", the silent recognition of the miserable living conditions among blacks, was what Damon Locks wanted to explore with his large ensemble from Chicago - a snapshot of the events of the past year around George Floyd and Black Lives Matter.
The result - funk, spiritual jazz, afro grooves, film dialogue snippets, cicadas - is even more electrifying than the critically acclaimed debut of 2019.
(8.3)
Matthew E. White & Lonnie Holley - "Broken Mirror: A Selfie Reflection"
The exalted »DSDS« candidate Shada would have a lot of pleasure in this half hour of weirdness with weird crowing and speaking chants.
»Instagrammin ', instagrammin'«, conjures up southern poet Lonnie Holley in the ten-minute title piece, freely associating the unreasonable demands of the social media era.
Soul visionary Matthew E. White's studio band plays oppressive, swirling P-funk.
Or Krautfunk?
Mind: blown.
(8.0)
Alyona Alyona - »Galas«
Is that the Ukrainian Lizzo now, because her body dimensions are similarly extensive?
No
The former kindergarten teacher raps about body positivity and tolerance, stereotypes and hatred on her second album anyway - in a tough, fast-paced pop-trap flow that can be found in tracks like "Chytay rap", "Pappi Pappi" (with Yoss Bones) or " Bro «(with Noga Erez) seriously impressed, even if you don't understand much at first.
By the way, »Galas« means »hype« in Ukrainian.
In this case: Believe it.
(7.8)