Tag: the black album

#64 Weeknd: Dawn FM

~ Lex Leeson ~ 1 Comment

The Weeknd, man, he was once the most intriguing and mysterious underground artist making revolutionary electronic music since Burial (please remember how I’m pronouncing that). In the slightly more than a decade since first causing underground noise as the anonymous electronic artist creating dank and dingy exposés of the grimy perversions of the apparent high rollers, he has eventually become… the biggest male pop star on the planet?? It’s definitely a valid argument to state that’s the case. And now, rather than singing explicitly and unflinchingly about the secret angst and anxiety of those who are supposed to have it all, he… No. He still pretty much does that. Maybe his biggest ever hit was about taking so much coke that your face goes numb, remember? I mean, we have to say ‘fair fucks’ to him, don’t we?

Here, let’s make it official:

WAIT, ARE YOU STILL A PIGEON??

My Life in Albums (part 2 97-06)

~ Lex Leeson ~ 8 Comments

You want an intro? You got that in part one! Let’s get down to the dirty, sticky and dangerously unhygienic business:

1997

This was an important year for me, this was when shit got real. Yeah, Labour won the election, which I was aware I was supposed to celebrate but not yet conscious enough to know exactly why, just that ‘our team won*. Princess Diana died, inspiring a nationwide reaction that even 13 year old Alex Palmer recognised as being a bit fucking much**. All that was meaningless background noise though, as most importantly 1997 was the year that I became really switched on to new music. Before this point, most of the albums I’ve listed would have been discovered by me later and posthumously lusted after in the kind of nostalgic necrophilia that I would later grow to despise. Yeah, sorry if you’ve already imagined me as an incredibly cool seven year old bopping his head to Soon by My Bloody Valentine. From this point on, these important albums in my life and personal development were pretty much all discovered as contemporaries. Seriously though, ‘It’s Great When You’re Straight… Yeah’ was the first CD that I ever owned. Yeah. I’m that cool/weird.

young-man-mohawk-carried-personalised-floral-tribute-while
“Dad, this is why you’re only allowed to see me one weekend every other month…”

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64 Kanye West: Jesus is King (& no.63)

~ Lex Leeson ~ 7 Comments

“Everybody wanted ‘Yandhi’/But Jesus Christ did the laundry” 

So Kanye ditched ‘Yandhi‘, which was late in its production and looked like it might become very worthwhile, to instead work on a completely new album. OK. I mean, switching projects completely so rapidly and frequently might not bode well for general standards of quality, but who am I to speak about artistic methods? I do this list every year and yet still manage to never let the quality slip below pelvis shattering power, so I’m sure lesser artists like Kanye will be able to ensure standards are still high. And it’s a gospel album?! Well colour me intrigued! Perhaps Kanye will be able to put similar spins on (and analysis of) the genre as Chance the Rapper did on ‘Coloring Book‘! Back when Chance was good! Perhaps, in the future, we will look back on ‘Yandhi’ as Kanye’s ‘Black Album‘, Prince’s mythical 1987 album that he allegedly dropped work on after experiencing a spiritual epiphany while on pills* and decide to instead focus on the gorgeous paean to the struggles of good over evil (and, y’know, shagging) that was ‘Lovesexy‘. Perhaps something happened to Kanye similar to Prince coming up and seeing the light. Kanye West doesn’t take good drugs though, guy has far too much upper body tension, so it’d be an experience more suited to him. Maybe he saw someone else wearing leather jogging pants- his invention!!- and it just pushed him over the edge. Maybe he realised the president he’s such a fan of is an unashamed racist and wants many of his fans removed from the country. Hard to say. Perhaps ‘Yandhi’ will finally receive a proper release in 7 years time and people will be ever so slightly disappointed

Prince Performs

(*described as a ‘bad experience on MDMA’ in the Wikipedia article, which, hehehe, no. Taking a pill and then deciding to drop the darker work you’re doing in favour of positive stuff that tries to bring love to everyone isn’t a ‘bad experience on MDMA’, it’s just what happens when you take pills)

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