Tag: metacritic

40 MARINA: Princess of Power

~ Lex Leeson ~ Leave a comment

Incredibly, implausibly and – let’s face it – improbably, Marina Diamandis is still duking it out on the Necessary Evil countdown.

This was going to be it: This was going to be the year that an artist that had become a feature of this annual countdown since almost its inception finally fell off the list. An artist that first burst into my consciousness in 2009 with the almost impossibly good debut hat-trick of singles (The outstanding Obsessions!! The immaculate I’m Not a Robot!! The mmmmm-decent Mowgli’s Road!!) that I was even moved to declare them an “Almost impossibly good debut trio of singles from the Welsh/Greek singer who seems all set to become Britain’s most interesting pop star when her (inevitably crushingly disappointing) debut album is released early in 2010”,.

I’m vulnerable so vulnerable

#15 Efficax: DESTRUCTION

~ Lex Leeson ~ 1 Comment

What more is there to say about the astonishing ‘Destruction’?

Oh no! I Googled ‘Destruction’ and it just came up with loads of stats from the Gaza genocide! That’s embarrassing! Innocent mistake though, hope you understand. I promise that I won’t mention the continued and UK sponsored slaughter happening right now in Gaza anymore on this list, I promise. And that photo will already be dated tomorrow, when the death count will likely have risen by a few hundred. What was I thinking posting it there completely accidentally??

Kenan Shadi Hashem Mushtaha

#1 Fever Ray: Radical Romantics (Greatest Album of 2023)

~ Lex Leeson ~ 1 Comment

This is for our careers

Putting my kid in high school

Even it Out… sort of

All year I adored the opening lines from ‘Radical Romantics’ fifth track. I loved the angry, vicious attack of the commodified work of an artist. How the work is no longer about inspiration or true artistic integrity, but just a career. Under capitalism it has become just another desperate attempt to ensure safety, housing, food and education for your family. And what does such a system force you to do with your artistic inclinations? Or maybe the social safety nets?? “And then we cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut/Cut, cut, cut, cut”. Comrade Karin Dreijer! Give those capitalist pigdogs what they deserve!

There’s no room for you
And we know where you live
One day we might come after you
Taking back what’s ours

Workers of the World unite!!

SUNSET IN THE MAZE (YOU’RE ASKING ME MY SYMPTONS, DOCTOR, I DON’T WANNA FEEL)

4 SZA: SOS

~ Lex Leeson ~ 4 Comments

This ain’t no warning shot, in case all of you hoes forgot, they know we’ve been more than lost. Us punk-asses tried to replace them but the stakes were too high, we weren’t able to live off some SZA mini-me. In December 8th 2022 they dumped this album like a press squeeze, they were horny like “Suck these”, daring like “Touch me”. They just want what’s theirs, after spending more than five years watching countless people try and fail to replicate the magic of their debut album.

And it’s hard to be a SZA mini-me. Their incredible 2017 debut album felt like a true moment in the history of recorded music. It’s one of the handful of 21st century records – as our tastes become more and more individualised and the latest stage of capitalism involves eliminating community and creating more dividing lines along identity – that is near unanimously considered an all-time classic. It spent more than 300 weeks on the Billboard top 200, selling millions of copies. You gotta rip that off, right??

OUT OF REACH, OUT OF TOUCH, TOO NUMB, I DON’T FEEL NO WAY

8 Ethel Cain: Preacher’s Daughter

~ Lex Leeson ~ 2 Comments

Fucking hell, first today I have to write about a black kid born into Jim Crow Alabama (like, literally Jim Crow, not just modern Alabama, which may still be accurately described as ‘Jim Crow Alabama’), now I get to Hayden Anhedönia, raised in one of those creepy Southern Baptist communities (Hayden was literally the preacher/dean’s son, and when their Daddy would visit they’d come along, while Mummy sung in the choir) and was home schooled. Home schooled!! You know that they’re fucked up. Why am I covering all of America’s weird and traumatic – but always buttressed by religious belief – traditions today?? Oh, and before you ask: no, there isn’t a song here as good as Olivia Rodrigo’s ballad of a homeschooled girl, so let’s nip that in the bud straight away.

I talked to this hot guy, swore I was his type
Guess that he was makin’ out with boys, like the whole night

I don’t get religious people. Hayden told their Mum that they liked boys when they were 12 and, yeah, I get how religious people don’t like unrepressed homosexuality (“I was the spawn of Satan to most people. The first person who told me that I wasn’t going to hell when I died was my therapist that my parents forced me to get when I was 16.”). Hayden left the family home aged 18, shaved their head for a while to try and be as masculine as possible (““I’m going to be a boy, and my family is going to love me, and I’m going to make them proud”), but that didn’t last long. On their 20th birthday, they came out as trans. What I don’t get is… Won’t their family accept them back now?? I get how they need to repress homosexuality – that’s kind of their ‘thing’ and it would be culturally insensitive for me to criticise that – but now Hayden is a woman who likes boys! They’ve come back around the other side! They’re straight again! Show me the part in the bible that disproves what I’m saying, you bunch of freaks. Didn’t Jesus come out of that cave three days after being crucified dressed as Trinity from The Matrix while praising the positive effects of their recent top surgery? Dude, look at that gorgeous flowing hair! You’re telling me a cis guy takes that much care over their hair routine?? Also, a carpenter?? So obviously a lesbian.

IF I TAKE A STEP BACK TO SEE THE GLASS HALF FULL

9 Lonnie Holley: Oh Me Oh My

~ Lex Leeson ~ 2 Comments

Lonnie Holley is one of those people whose very existence is a bit awkward for the United States of America. He’s a good looking guy, a few months older than my Dad but healthier looking than even me. He’s not some crinkly, confused, 112 year old veteran of the first world war, baring a toothless smile to the camera on the arm of his minder. A minder he needs to remind him to put his underpants on in the morning, and works overtime changing him considering the amount of times each day he pisses himself. He is still plugged in, still 100% articulate, more creatively engaged now aged 73 than he’s ever been. He didn’t become an artist until he was 29. He didn’t even begin releasing music until he was 62. There’s no rush.

Which all means he has pretty vivid memories of being born in Jim Crow era Alabama.

THAT YOU’LL MAKE IT BACK TO MY BED, GET ME HOT AND SIZZLIN’

10 yeule: softscars

~ Lex Leeson ~ 2 Comments

Soft scars on my skin, silicone, porcelain
I’m not one of them, love you ’til thе end
Give me onе more dose, turn me into a rose
Water me ’til I wither, 404 error

God created man, motherboard, wires and
Blood, bones, flesh, breathing, suicide engineering
Soft scars on my skin, silicone, porcelain
I’m not one of them, love you ’til the end

x w x

Oh my God! That’s it! Fuck you, Protomartyr, with your “kissing the ass of billionaires” nonsense, why should I listen to any of you? You’re all, like, a million years old. Nat Ćmiel, the Singaporean genius behind yeule, is in their mid twenties, they know what human beings’ attempted relationship with the online world is grasping at. Ćmiel knows that we’re not reaching out to praise a capitalistic God. They know that capitalism has already beaten any true beliefs out of us. Late stage capitalism has divided us, it has forced us into isolation, crushed anything approaching ‘community’ into tiny pieces of dust and demanded that those pieces of dust reach out to nobody, just become statistics and scrolling machines to tempt enough of the other specks of dust to pay their own subscriptions so they can wokescold you for buying a McDonalds, because you don’t really have the time nor money to do all you’re allowed to do to protest Israeli genocide. Of course, if we just came together and organised we could maybe make real roads towards overthrowing the imperialist system, making atrocities like the ones taking place in Israel, Yemen… Oh, never mind, you’re still writing a lengthy post complaining about Nat Ćmiel using they/them pronouns, aren’t you? We’re all on the same side, you egg sucking dog.

EXCUSE MY STATE, I’M AS HIGH AS YOUR HOPES

11 Protomartyr: Formal Growth in the Desert

~ Lex Leeson ~ 1 Comment

That’s kind of what the Internet or modern life is like. You’re throwing all this stuff—personality, or music, or whatever the hell—into the Internet, and you have no way of really knowing if anybody’s reacting to it. A lot of times you’re just throwing it down a well, or you’re hoping that someone’s hearing you. It’s kind of like people praying to God; it’s the hope that somebody can hear you, but they probably don’t. You especially see it now on Twitter, or X, or whatever the fuck it’s called, you know—the people really kissing the ass of billionaires. (mockingly) “Please, please, look at me!” It’s not a very original thought. But it is weird that people are basically praying to these billionaires now. “Notice me!” That sort of thing.”

singer Joe Casey explains a a line from Let’s Tip the Creator to Tune Glue

And in explaining how the content they have created comments on mindless content creation, the Swamp Rock David Cameron (Joe Casey) both creates content for one website while also leaving themselves open to be quoted by a second website (hello!) to open a post on why the wider content that included twelve separate but intertwined pieces of created content was the eleventh greatest such collections of content in a near arbitrary period.

LAST NIGHT REALLY WAS THE CHERRY ON THE CAKE

15 Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter: SAVED!

~ Lex Leeson ~ 2 Comments

Religion sounds like a hoot, doesn’t it? Like, imagine if you were into Live Action Roleplaying/LARP or civil war re-enactments, you loved all the play pretend that you had to work within (“Put your phone away, Stuart!”), loved these artificial rules that you’re being asked to work under. And then some weirdo, probably wearing a cloak and maybe a golden hat, comes up to you and says “A’ight, that’s cool and all, but I’ve got a game that you have to play you’re whole life, and if you break any of our artificial rules, you’ll burn in hell for eternity!!” That’d be pretty dope, no?

the next step after atheism is ‘TikTok Live NPCs’

Mate, religion is some next level LARPing. You’re always in the game because this God, or these Gods, they’re everywhere, all the time, and they can see everything you do. And the punishment for breaking the rules isn’t just some sinbin, or a disapproving look from Janet because they don’t believe you should be wearing New Balance sneakers if you’re supposed to be an Elemental Elf. If you get the rules wrong, this God character – or these God characters – will burn your soul for eternity!! And you thought Rio getting eight months for missing that drug test was excessive! And yes, that is the most recent cultural reference I can think of! Oh, and some of these Gods have, like, lions for heads and shit, you do not want to fuck with them. Seriously, they’re metal as fuck.

TOKE THIS JOINT HOW I’M BLOWIN’ THIS STEAM