Fucking hell, Denzel Curryand Wilma Vritra? I really am a fucking insufferable BandCamp edgelord white boy, aren’t I? You’re all waiting for Earl Sweatshirt now, aren’t you? I’ve definitely have a ‘Die Lit’ poster above my breakfast bar, don’t I? Because I absolutely have a breakfast bar.
My husband and I wake up every morning and bring our coffee out to our ‘Die Lit’ breakfast bar and sit and talk for hours. Every morning. It never gets old and we never run out of things to talk. Love Playboi Carti him so much.
There is no quicker way to make me disregard a musician you’re recommending, no line to more immediately force me to role my eyes more comprehensively into the back of my head to the extent that they circle round to raise above my bottom eyelid with fresh knowledge of whether my frontal lobe should smile more, than to tell me that they’re a great guitarist.
This recommendation will come from people who would scoff at the volume of a bull elephant being neutered if you explained how some artist was worth listening to because they were a good singer or a great pianist or a extremely accomplished hydraulophoneplayer. And, leaving the hairy old rock boi hypocrisy aside, they’d actually be right to. Just tone down the snark, OK lads? We’re all friends here.
Don’t say “Nice pair” Say “I love the symmetry of you” Don’t say “But I’m allowed to say that Because I grew up in a black neighbourhood” Say “My n… eighbour” Don’t say “You speak my language surprisingly well” Say “Do you speak Esperanto?” Don’t say “Only a man is fit for this job” Say “At least you tried, Karen” Don’t say “I would like a black Americano” Say “I’ll have an African American please” Don’t say “White people can’t dance” Say “Tom marches to the beat of a different drum” Don’t say “So you’re from China, do you know my friend Hiro?” Say “You must be blind not to see the difference” Don’t say “We need to build a wall” Say “I’m a world citizen, I don’t believe in borders”
This album is a fucking riot and – considering that since March every single person on Earth has had an invitation – if you haven’t joined this party yet you need to have serious words with yourself. Serious words. No other album in the world could so easily combine the dankest beats and electronic dance music, with songs that combine tales of one member (Charlotte) being catcalled as a thirteen year old, but then also combined with another band member (Bolis) explaining their own sexual awakening by way of Acqua Di Gio perfume, but then moves on to Charlotte’s failed attempt to eat food sexually in order to attract a boy named Stéphane only “I couldn’t locate my mouth anymore/The nacho fell straight into my empty bra/Stéphane ended up with Nadia”. There’s a lot happening here! And, fuck Nadia, right? No! I didn’t mean it like that, I meant…
Oh Aggie, your beating heart was a carriage made of gold How the arithmetic of this guitar melts your heart is beyond me And when I say beyond me, I mean beyond me Love ya? I barely know you, it goes to show Who really knows what love is? The branches, the breeze, the roiling seas None of it seems worth mentioning Though I’m in the process of figuring it out Even if it’s elementary A scrapyard angel, wings of brass Ash, a river called trash And speaking of lifelike, this is what life’s like You thread the needle, then the needle runs dry You thread the needle, then the needle runs dry “Inward Crackle,” says the fink to himself Oh well, I wasn’t taught how to Go off like a, go off like a, go off like a, go off like a Go off like a hydrogen bomb But I do radiate a certain glow It flutters and fades, a Ferris wheel on the run from the snow You have to look at it from all angles Says the cubist judge from cubist jail The sky glows, the heat is unbearable Parrot weather My decision is final, a crazy game I traded in moonlight for the morning dew I know dusk when I see one I know rust when I see it You come out swinging, but you go down swinging too You pay good money for a million dollar view Flipping the pages of Chatelaine The rude empiricism of every troubled loser Quote, unquote, unquote A moment alone please A moment alone please A moment alone please With this, with this With this rhapsody With this rhapsody Vital information from where I’m standing Low-born Madonna With her typewriters in the rain Clacking their misfortunes, speech, speech A figure of light’s trapped inside your kimono Absent friends, where’d you go? And while we’re on the subject of psychotic passwords Honing in on nothing Everywhere Rome goes Everybody wants her Ah fuck, I feel like a discovery someone once saw On a clear day Dump him
I’m always wary of reacting to a Kendrick Lamar release. I’m far more scared of sharing my views on Mr Lamar than I am doing so with Taylor Swift (and even Pusha T), as I’m far more anxious about the Kendrickers than I am of the Swifties. And definitely more scared of them than I am of the Pushas, as that fangroup ain’t shit! Your hero calls me out (by, cough, ahem, misunderstanding the article and proving my point) and I don’t get one death threat or doxxing attempt?? We have a word for you around the Necessary Evil household: S… A… W… F… T… SAWFT! You casuals’ arms ain’t long enough to box with God. Hell, your arms ain’t long enough to wash my balls.
OK, so Sister 2 Sisteris track four and it just sends me, knowarra mean? When that chorus hits and it’s all like:
Dancing in front of the mirror Singing along with Shakira
Already I love, love, love love it. What an adorably succinct and heartwarming depiction of sisterly love. And ‘sisterly’ love doesn’t need to refer to literal siblings (even if it might do originally for Ibeyi’s twin sisters Lisa-Kaindé and Naomi Diaz), but that sorority that can exist between friends. I mean, I guess. I grew up with two brothers and all my friends at school were boys (I was terrified of girls until…
You wanna kill me? Well, here’s your chance I can barely get around now as it fucking stands You wanna see me, but you just can’t get passed How I look or talk or think or walk, and it’s fucking sad
I don’t know what I can do To make you comfortable With what you see before you So let me let you know that
I’m not cisgender, I’m not binary, trans I don’t wanna be a girl, I don’t wanna be a man I’m just existing on this God-forsaken land And you can take it or leave it Or you can just stay back, stay back
Heeeeey, you know what the world needs more of? Straight, cis, old, fat, white guys judging the scorched soul searching of young black queer people! Yeah yeah, Shamir, boohoo for you, tissues for your issues, but allow me to state the proper reaction to your inner trauma. “I’m just a faggot, who lives like a maggot”?? Hey! That’s our word for making fun of you people! So now we’re allowed to call you lot ‘queer’ and you get to use the F word?? And yet when I use the N word as a joke at my job I’m suspended from teaching primary school PE for a whole two weeks?! No fair! Where’s my artistic communication of hopelessness in a world that’s still depressingly oppressed against me?? I just wanna use the N word and bully queer people online!! Truly, we are the lost generation. Thank God that comedy is now legal on Twitter, because I’ve got some bangers.
Never been in Pitchfork?? That can’t be right, those motherfuckers review everything. When I released my first mixtape, ‘Phish Pale’, back in 2011, they even reviewed that piece of shit and gave it a respectable 6.8. I get it, that line is obviously meant to emphasise how bafflingly obscure she remains despite being consistently responsible for some of the greatest hip-hop of the past decade, but it’s not meant to be taken literally. Let’s just search the Pitchfork site:
Necessary Evil 