Tyler, The Creator - IGOR Review

What? Tyler, The Creator is evolving!

I'll admit, I had lost my interest in the self-described creator ever since his follow-up release to his major label debut, WOLF. I had an early interest in Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All when they first arrived on the scene, boasting a large entourage of rappers and producers and putting out multiple albums and mixtapes and cross-promoting each other with features. I mostly just kept tabs on Tyler while I predicted that his protegé Earl Sweatshirt was going to eclipse him artistically. While over the years, Earl, who has stayed largely in the same minimalist, lo-fi musical landscape, Tyler, The Creator, has grown in style and ambition and has created an entirely new image for himself in his acclaimed hip-hop, R&B, and funk soaked album, IGOR.

Flying Lotus - Flamagra Review

Flying Lotus has become an amalgam of jazz, hip-hop, and electronica ever since he burst onto the scene with his minimalist beat-driven debut LP, 1983. A dusty, stripped-down collection of beats and electronic songs which defined him and defined an era of the late 2000s glitch hop scene. Since then, he has continued forward in big and exciting ways, releasing his touchstone classic, Los Angeles, and pushing forward into more styles and genres that all seem to melt into one signature sound in his follow-up works, Cosmogramma, Until The Quiet Comes, and You're Dead! This was a period of serious experimentation and collaboration into the genres of hip-hop, jazz, fusion, and cinematic, orchestrated greatness, and Flying Lotus, aka Steven Ellison, began a wild career full of all-star collaborations on these records. Artists such as Thundercat, Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Erykah Badu, Radiohead's Thom Yorke, Snoop Dogg, and Kendrick Lamar, are just a few of the many team-ups gracing Ellison's catalog, and these artists and his forward-driving sound give them all a special place in history. Like Ellison's past work, Flamagra continues this tradition with more of that definitive experimentation in his most dynamic album to date.

Marvin Gaye - You're The Man Review

Preserved in a time capsule and shelved for decades, Marvin Gaye’s “lost album” You’re The Man finally sees the light of day on March 29, 2019, nearly half a century after its originally intended release, and I can’t believe that I have the pleasure of reviewing a Marvin Gaye album as a “brand new” release! The original sequel to his landmark classic album What’s Going On, You’re The Man was shelved due to political differences between Gaye and Motown Records founder Berry Gordy, and also due to poor reception of his title track lead single, but whereas What’s Going On was intended as an anti-war album, You’re The Man is a triumphant anti-hate album.