AlunaGeorge’s Hit-or-Miss ‘Body Music’ Proves That Killer Alt-R&B Singles...
Body Music, the full-length debut from British duo AlunaGeorge, could have made an excellent EP. The math is there, all right. Set aside the three 2012 electro-R&B numbers — "You Know You Like It,"...
View ArticleJanelle Monae’s ‘The Electric Lady’ Strives to Match Her Sci-Fi Ambitions and...
Janelle Monáe's ongoing multi-album Metropolis project is a post-millennial homage to Fritz Lang's roaring twenties dystopia, and a framework for the fervently precocious futurist-R&B ideas of the...
View ArticleFreddie Gibbs and Madlib Craft a Deft, Eccentric Street-Rap Epic on ‘Pinata’
Piñata, the full-length collaboration between 21st-century gangster rapper Freddie Gibbs and 31st-century producer Madlib, lulls breezily between pro forma thuggery and Swisha Sweet insights, mixing...
View ArticleThe Roots Save Their Sour Notes for the Quizzically Bleak ‘…And Then You...
In this post-Internet age of cross-platform synergy as condo down-payment survival, the Roots have flourished. There is the band on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, an incredible sight for...
View ArticleKendrick Lamar Has Already Won in Every Way, But Sure, He’ll Take a Grammy Too
Back in 2009, just as Kendrick Lamar began to gain notice on blogs such as 2dopeboyz.com, he offered this lyric on "I Am (Interlude)," from his self-titled EP: "See, y’all don’t understand me / My plan...
View ArticleReview: Open Mike Eagle and Paul White Get Up Close and Well, You Know, on...
If the late, lamented revolutionary poet Gil Scott-Heron was a college-bound poet today, he might be writing raps in the vein of Open Mike Eagle. The comparison isn’t so far-fetched; Eagle cuts through...
View ArticleSPIN R&B Report: Tweet Flutters Back Into View, K. Michelle Puts the Real in...
Yes, there’s more to R&B in early 2016 than Anderson .Paak. The Los Angeles dynamo has been rightly lionized for blending hip-hop, pimpish soul, and skate-park pop on his second album Malibu,...
View ArticleReview: Come Test Death Grips and Get Sliced on ‘Bottomless Pit’
Four years ago, Death Grips exemplified the anti-corporate violence and rugged individualism of black-bloc anarchism. The tattooed and bearded Stefan Burnett boomed and growled like a punk incarnation...
View ArticleLife After Death Row: A Guide to Snoop Dogg’s Post-‘Doggystyle’ Career
The quarter-century-long career of Calvin Broadus — a.k.a. Snoop Doggy Dogg — is full of contradictions. He’s a husband and father whose devotion to his family is evident in such heartwarming reality...
View ArticleReview: NAO Fumbles Toward Ecstasy on ‘For All We Know’
British R&B singer Neo Joshua has charted a slow — yet inexorable — path to her own startling breakout moment. She entered as one-fifth of the Boxettes, a quintet that earned some notice in 2011...
View ArticleReview: Rae Sremmurd Dim the Fun, Along With the Lights, on ‘SremmLife 2′
Last year, it was impossible to go anywhere — a nightclub, a rooftop barbecue, even the supermarket — without hearing the manically gleeful chants of Rae Sremmurd. The brothers Swae Lee and Slim Jxmmi...
View ArticleSPIN R&B Report: Yuna Props Up Woozy Soul With Smelling Salts, Laura Mvula...
While the world spent much of this year waiting for Frank Ocean, R&B continued to evolve. This season’s picks illustrate that there’s a thriving crop of sounds beyond the pop and social-media...
View ArticleCan Yhung T.O. Be the Bay’s Pensive New Star?
"Y’all got that cinnamon shit?" asks Yhung T.O. in a soft murmur, anxious to relieve a lingering cold with a cup of hot tea. It’s late afternoon in November at a studio called The Mix Room in Burbank,...
View ArticleFreddie Gibbs and Madlib Craft a Deft, Eccentric Street-Rap Epic on ‘Pinata’
7 SPIN Rating: 7 of 10Release Date: March 18, 2014Label: Madlib Invazion Piñata, the full-length collaboration between 21st-century gangster rapper Freddie Gibbs and 31st-century producer Madlib,...
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Freddie Gibbs and Madlib Craft a Deft, Eccentric Street-Rap Epic on ‘Pinata’
7 SPIN Rating: 7 of 10Release Date: March 18, 2014Label: Madlib Invazion Piñata, the full-length collaboration between 21st-century gangster rapper Freddie Gibbs and 31st-century producer Madlib,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Roots Save Their Sour Notes for the Quizzically Bleak ‘…And Then You...
6 SPIN Rating: 6 of 10Release Date: May 20, 2014Label: Island Def Jam In this post-Internet age of cross-platform synergy as condo down-payment survival, the Roots have flourished. There is the band...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Kendrick Lamar Has Already Won in Every Way, But Sure, He’ll Take a Grammy Too
Back in 2009, just as Kendrick Lamar began to gain notice on blogs such as 2dopeboyz.com, he offered this lyric on “I Am (Interlude),” from his self-titled EP: “See, y’all don’t understand me / My...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Review: Open Mike Eagle and Paul White Get Up Close and Well, You Know, on...
7 SPIN Rating: 7 of 10Release Date: March 18, 2016Label: Mello Music Group If the late, lamented revolutionary poet Gil Scott-Heron was a college-bound poet today, he might be writing raps in the vein...
View ArticleClik here to view.
SPIN R&B Report: Tweet Flutters Back Into View, K. Michelle Puts the Real in...
Yes, there’s more to R&B in early 2016 than Anderson .Paak. The Los Angeles dynamo has been rightly lionized for blending hip-hop, pimpish soul, and skate-park pop on his second album Malibu,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Review: Come Test Death Grips and Get Sliced on ‘Bottomless Pit’
8 SPIN Rating: 8 of 10Release Date: May 06, 2016Label: Third Worlds / Harvest Four years ago, Death Grips exemplified the anti-corporate violence and rugged individualism of black-bloc anarchism. The...
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