Kanye West
Yeezus [GOOD Music]
Yeezus is a tale of stress and release, of abrasive and confrontational music and lyrics giving way inevitably to melodic, ambrosial sighs. It’s tempting to say that this reflects a conflict within our beloved artiste, a friction that’s created as the two most consistent themes from College Dropout onwards bump together so much that it becomes impossible to ignore. There’s good life, and there’s politics, and the answers found on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and Watch The Throne (largely The Jay-Z Answer, where being rich and black is enough in itself to stick it to the system) aren’t good enough.
There are no new answers here either, just more aggressive railing, finally delivered with sufficient drama that it can’t be swept over by the teenage sons and daughters of the racists he’s decrying. New Slaves directly addresses the double standard: “Doing clothes, you woulda thought I had help/But they wasn’t satisfied unless I picked the cotton myself.” Later, Blood On The Leaves juxtaposes the beautiful, harrowing Strange Fruit (about lynching) against No Limit rapper C-Murder’s Down For My Niggas, with Kanye adding a song about being disappointed by a woman over the top. It’s a controversial three-way, understandably, but it seems to highlight some of the issues surrounding being Kanye, who was never considered insane until he told white people that George Bush doesn’t care about black people. There’s tension and history beneath every black record you dismiss as mindless, it seems to say, whether it’s jazz standards, New Orleans murder-cruft or Kanye.
As a whole, the conflict makes Yeezus interesting, but not hugely enjoyable. There are no Elton John outros or Nicki Minaj punch-ins, and Kanye’s conversion to a musical practice that fits his own idea of ‘artist’ seems nigh complete. Furrow your brow, discuss, even nod your head, but don’t expect to be dancing around handbags to this. –Karl McDonald
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViGNBLQpGWE
Queens of the Stone Age
…Like Clockwork [Matador]
Josh Homme’s desert rock troupe return after a moderately long absence with a brooding set drawing on acid-tinged 70s psych rock. The production and arrangements are so well-rendered they border on pastiche at times, but the older, gnarlier QOTSA have delivered an undeniably solid record here. Though the lacking the manic energy of the Rated R era, Kalopsia and the melancholic title track are a testament to Homme’s worthiness as a tunesmith. -Ivan Deasy
James Holden
The Inheritors [Border Community]
The manipulation of analogue and modular sources within a digital framework lends Holden’s much-anticipated return on Inheritors a supernaturalist drive that typifies the best krautrock albums (and most recently Geoff Barrow’s work as Beak>), pushing it beyond mere mimicry into a celestial territory his earlier work could only graze. Wild, expansive and bewitching, The Inheritors ranks as yet another masterwork for 2013. –Daniel Gray
Hebosagil
Lähtö [Ektro Records]
Raw, grinding sludge from Finland. The leap in fidelity from the band’s previous releases adds a lot of depth to the goings on here, with the incredible vocals occupying the focal point, supported by sinuous, abrasive riffs and brain punching percussion. At a terse 25 minutes, this is perfect for a concise blast of concerted negativity. Check it out if you have even a passing interest in heavy muzaks. -Ivan Deasy
Halves
Boa Howl [S/R]
Hewn from autumnal all-dayers in Göteborg studios replete with all the tools to make music nerds go gooey (Two-inch tape! Neve console!), Boa Howl is monolithically big and serious post-rock. Halves should be complimented on the scale of their ambition alone, producing a widescreen record draped in orchestral finery however the reliance on tropes of the genre and the sonic feats of the recording lend it a murkiness that renders much of the record indistinct. -Ian Lamont
