Enlarge image
Pop phenomenon Lizzo
Photo:
WarnerMusic
Album of the week:
Attention, trigger warning, now comes a very, very delicate phrase in this context.
But it's no use, and Lizzo, the US singer-rapper in question, would probably be the first to laugh out loud at that squirming lyric opening alone.
At least one hopes so.
So come on, because we have to talk about the literal elephant in the room: everyone loves Lizzo for her fight for body positivity, her humor, her fearless handling of her "big girl" body, her nude photos on Instagram, her casting show, in who casts plus-size dancers for which she just got an Emmy nomination.
She already has three Grammys and an impressive number of hits with »Truth Hurts«, »Juice« and her latest single »About Damn Time«.
Lizzo is a pop culture stunner, a major symbol of the fact that you don't have to look like R&B supermodel Beyoncé or porn fantasies like Cardi B and Nicki Minaj to be successful as an African American artist.
Lizzo role model Missy Elliott can rap many verses about it.
On »Special«, which a German music magazine called one of the most important releases of the year even before it was published, Lizzo is even more self-confident than before: prettier, stronger, hornier.
But, and now the »elephant« is finally coming, why is their music still so under-complex and generic, almost catchy?
That was already a disruptive factor on their first pop album »Cuz I Love You«, now it continues.
Of course, the message - empowerment of plump women - may still be more important than the music, so it seems logical to focus on the greatest possible mass compatibility rather than electronic experiments or avant-garde.
But it's annoying.
And it's a pity.
The overly thin tone is set right away in the first track »The Sign«: the lyrics are funny and energetic, a declaration of war on all haters: »Hi motherfuckers, did you miss me«, Lizzo asks coquettishly, and then in the usual way above her To raise the emphasis: "I've been training so I can shake that ass," she raps, "and I know you see me coming cause I'm thick."
Pounding, but the sound is UK garage and 2-step, which in this light variant is probably not even played on British afternoon radio anymore.
»About Damn Time« is the already successful disco anthem, which also features Sasha Flute, Lizzo's flute.
The 34-year-old from Detroit is a trained musician who was once invited by Prince to his studio to play music.
The verse copies the teasing phrasing of Wet Leg's indie hit "Chaise Longue," and the rest of the song, produced by hit makers like Benny Blanco and Ricky Reed, has little of its own for all its groove thrust.
»Grrrls«, the track with the widely criticized use of an ableist term in an earlier version, doesn't have much to offer musically apart from a sample of the notorious Beastie Boys hit »Girls«.
Worse are the songs in the middle part, co-produced by Max "Baby One More Time" Martin, including "2 Be Loved (Am I Ready)", "I Love You Bitch" (a man should dare the chorus!) and with »Everybody's Gay« another disco number: Here Lizzo's empowering pop flows completely into motivational music, a feel-good soundtrack embracing all diversity to ranschmeißer beats and humpta hooks, perfect for the soul aerobics of marginalized sections of the population.
»In case nobody told you today: you're special«, Lizzo formulates her credo in the retro soul of the title track.
It's great, but why is it always applied so thickly?
advertisement
Lizzo
Special
Label: Atlantic
Label: Atlantic
approx. €17.99
price inquiry time
07/15/2022 12:06 p.m
No guarantee
Order from Amazon
Order from Thalia
Order from Weltbild
Product reviews are purely editorial and independent.
Via the so-called affiliate links above, we usually receive a commission from the retailer when you make a purchase.
More information here
As soon as the message becomes secondary, the album gets more depth: »Naked« is a wonderfully spirited bedroom and sex ballad, which contains lyrics like »I'm a big girl, can you take it?«, but that The word »naked« sometimes transcends beyond body dimensions.
The best song is of all things the final piece with the impossible title »Coldplay« (including a sample): because this is just about a perfectly normal love story,
nothing special,
but universal, interpersonal emotional stuff, packed in beautiful, exhilarating, melancholic uptempo R&B.
Lizzo's self-presentation as a cheerful bundle of joy who doesn't want to offend musically can also become a trap if it becomes an end in itself.
It would be the most beautiful, strongest, sexiest pop utopia if talented female artists like Lizzo didn't have to emphasize their physical "specialness" in order to assert themselves against beauty dogmas produced by the media, but rather their music, their voice, their songwriting (about which topics however) may be considered special enough.
It would be
about damn time
.
(6.0)
Listened briefly:
Black Midi – »Hellfire«
The turbulent procession »Calvalcade«, the last album by the British jazz-art-prog rock band Black Midi, now leads straight into the »Hellfire« of our miserable, shattered times just over a year later.
Straight away (nice word) also because the 39 still very hectic minutes of this third album leave a little room for the first time to reveal something like coherence or even: song structures.
For example in the hardcore derivative »Eat Men Eat« or in the post-rocking groove of »Welcome To Hell«, in which frontman Geordie Greep, who is more declaiming than singing, sends a soldier named Tristan Bongo to war.
A panopticon of contemporary Mistfits and Madmen populates the rest of the fantasmagorical-brutal lyrics.
"Still", the meanwhile obligatory ballad, nicely enriched with wind instruments,
staggers between more exalted bowie and classic flaming lips.
"The Race Is About To Begin" is a sour Bob Dylan folk tale in high-speed mode, "The Defense" and other songs on the album seem like diabolically processed American songbook standards with Greep as a revenant sneaky crooner like Scott Walker.
It's less the frantic chaos and more narrative character sculpting.
A musical hellfire that also burns brightly on a slightly smaller flame.
It's less the frantic chaos and more narrative character sculpting.
A musical hellfire that also burns brightly on a slightly smaller flame.
It's less the frantic chaos and more narrative character sculpting.
A musical hellfire that also burns brightly on a slightly smaller flame.
(8.0)
Dina Summer – »Rimini«
What time of year could be better for releasing an album with a nostalgic Italo-Disco sound?
The heat wave in Bella Italia is currently so bad that even Lake Garda has had to be tapped to deal with the drought and water shortages.
The group around Dina Summer consists of the internationally successful DJ duo Local Suicide from Berlin, who have just released their very good debut album "Eros Anikate", as well as the electronic musician and Frittenbude producer Jakob Häglsperger alias Kalipo.
The clou: The sweetness of melodies, reminiscent of Italo classics by Miko Mission, Raf or Righeira from the eighties, is contrasted with ice-cold and minimalist electro wave and techno, pulsating sequencer sounds, synthetic handclaps and archetypal e-drums included.
Local Suicide half Dina Summer speaks sensual dominatrix announcements to this retro-futuristic sound, also with a very cool voice and charming English accent.
Sometimes also in German, like in the ice ton banger »Wunderbar«.
The perfect summer album: It gets sweaty in the discotheca, but the gelato stays frozen.
amore!
(7.9)
Beabadoobee - »Beatopia«
»Beatopia«, says the musician Beatrice Laus from London, who was born in the Philippines, is the imaginary place she has been fleeing to since she was seven years old: a pixie wonderland where Laus escaped from school bullying, later racism, and family stress and escaped depression.
A few years ago, she became a YouTube and then a Tik-Tok phenomenon with her song "Coffee". The 22-year-old released her music on the British label Dirty Hit, which also features Generation Z idols like The 1975 and Rina Sawayama has under contract.
Up until now, however, her hypersensitive bedroom pop has hardly had anything contemporary to offer: for a long time she thought she had to stage herself as the pop version of the »Scott Pilgrim« comic character Ramona Flowers because of her early viral successes and could benefit from her trademark sound, ragged nineties low fi rock,
not deviate.
Their debut album »Fake It Flowers« sounded correspondingly inhibited.
But now, two years, therapy and a mood-clearing lockdown later, she lets fresh air, folk-pop ("Ripples") and melodious orchestral experiments into her beat utopia.
»The Perfect Pair«, one of the best tracks on the album, surprises with a gentle Bossa rhythm. »Broken CD« also swings through suddenly wide open spaces.
»Tinkerbell Is Overrated« overflows with psychedelic gimmicks.
When the old loud pavement fuzz comes back into play, in "10:36" or "Talk," Laus dares more gripping hooks and snappier lyrics, as if she were a contemporary update of Avril Lavigne.
The best indication that Beabadoobee is gradually coming to terms with herself is the absence of her usual colorful hair dyeing in recent photos.
(7.6)
