200 Words

200 Words is a blog focusing on new music, where each post is written using just 200 words.

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Album: SOHN – ‘Tremors’

SOHN’s talent is undeniable. Since his first releases he always received attention and plaudits as a singer and producer – including prestigious productions for Kwabs and Banks. His songs Bloodflows and The Wheel definitely deserved this appreciation, but somehow I was never totally sure if he would get the outmost of his already proved potential. In the run up to his debut-album ‘Tremors’ my concerns were confirmed: Artifice felt like the appetizer that I just wasn’t waiting for. It felt plastic and overproduced while SOHN excels in the more bare and warm tracks.

His debut-album kind of affirms this duality: one half of the album is beautiful, and the the other half feels overdone. The beautiful half of the album contains the more subtle and subdued songs like Tremors, Veto, and the already released Bloodflows and The Wheel. In contrast are the songs that are more aggressive in their production. Songs like Artifice, Fool and Ransom Notes don’t match with SOHN’s tender voice. It feels like SOHN’s biggest lack is the inability to bring his talents – both singing and producing – to a synthesis on ‘Tremors’.

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Album: Chet Faker – ‘Built in Glass’

FYI I am NOT an RnB artist. Never have been.

— Chet Faker (@Chet_Faker) April 9, 2014

Following the release of debut album ‘Built in Glass’, Chet Faker challenged its reviewers not to get stuck in thinking in genres. Artists that say these things might come across snobby, but they are assigning a weak spot in music writing. In giving a description of the sounds heard, a genre-reference is often the easiest way to go. But with calling Chet Faker an RnB artist, his music is thrown in a huge tradition with all sorts of connotations, which might just deprive the sounds of the chance of ‘being heard as they are’.

On Built in Glass, Chet Faker put this challenge into form. Its total is impossible to fit under one umbrella and its components cover a too wide range of sounds to be squeezed in one word. Well aware of his voice’s potential, essayistic lyrics are smeared on choiry adlibs, reeling between push-forward head-bobbing rhythms and more modest and reserved compositions. From lipping and sobbing sequences, the tracks might suddenly erupt in dramatic cries, with the persistent feeling that Faker knows what he’s doing. It makes a daring and even more interesting whole, which might bring as much joy to those that call him an RnB artist, as to those that want to look further.

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Chrome Sparks – Goddess

At first it is unclear what goddess Jeremy Malvin, better known as Chrome Sparks, is telling us about in his homonymous track. Things do get lofty, as dim and dusty synths lead us to deep kicks and guitarry synths, but they’re not celestial. It’s part of what we know from the previous ‘Sparks EP’: those powerful and driving sounds, kept in control by lingering beats. Though, that EP also made a second promise. In milliseconds, its tracks could turnover and move to different heights. Right when remembering that promise, this track went divine.

With endless repetition of trance builds and house drops, the definition of ‘musical ecstasy’ has devaluated a lot. With Goddess though, Chrome Sparks restores some of that value. A third in, synths go skyward in guiding melodies. Not leading to any kind of drop or redemption of accumulated emotion or whatever, but simply to stay skyward for a mere minute. We meet the goddess in the form of a prolonged sequence of harmonies, but without anything to hold on to, we aren’t able to stay there. As the divine ecstasy fades, we return to the dim and dusty beginnings. When, in our everlasting search of divinity, we simply hit replay.

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Album: Slime – ‘In The Brick House’

We haven’t heard from Slime, the multi-instrumentalist and Vondelpark-relative from Newcastle,in a while. After he released his latest ‘Increases II’ in 2012, the perfect follow-up of 2011’s ‘Increases I’, it remained silent around the youngster. While Vondelpark drew attention with their perfect debut album ‘Seabeds’, Slime apparently worked on a new sound in silence. That sound is presented on his new mixtape ‘In The Brick House’ and is truly different than on his previous EP’s.

The mixtape sounds a lot warmer and less electric than earlier work, thanks to the use of different instruments. Especially the addition of various horns is noticeable (Set In Solva) and the songs are structured into different parts, which also makes them less repetitive. The collaborations with different vocalist are also of added value – Brainfeeder-member and rapper Jeremiah Jae on Patricia’s Stories and George Maple on Sonnet. Slime made a risky choice by changing his successful and upcoming sound, but it was worth the risk. ‘In The Brick House’ is a superb effort of an exploring and gifted musician. It’s available for free, so download it right now and give it an attentive listen.

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Album: Mac DeMarco – ‘Salad Days’

I’ve seen Mac DeMarco performing one of his famous live concerts in Amsterdam. Almost all the ingredients were there: he pulled of his shirt, he climbed around the venue (including the balcony), he yelled some crazy things, he wore his famous cap, he played his guitar until his fingers were bleeding and wiped the blood on his face, but most importantly he played some great music. Everything can be said about his freaky appearances on video and in live shows, but Mac is also an ingenious musician with an extremely remarkable and innovating sound.

After he released his previous album ‘2’, I had the anxiety that he couldn’t exploit his music anymore; the album was based on his typical but somewhat unilateral guitar playing. Mac DeMarco proves the opposite with ‘Salad Days’:  he kept parts of his typical guitar sound, but added something to it. The songs are deeper and slower, and Mac’s sluggish vocals never bores the listener – even though he doesn’t vary much. Mac managed to remain the jester of the alternative music scene, while ‘Salad Days’ sounds – in contrast with its title – more mature than his previous releases. Hopefully his live shows will never get mature; probably Mac would play his new repertoire naked or hanging of a balcony.

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Big Boi’s Mashup Mondays

Big Boi’s post-Outkast career has been quite the struggle, at least for me, as I haven’t found myself enjoying his recent efforts as much as those in the ATL-crownwork. Well, maybe it’s not fair to keep comparing him to something he will probably never outdo, or to his efficient but quiet companion André 3000, but it remains sad that such a wonderful talent appears to have passed. Albums like ‘Sir Lucious Leftfoot’ and ‘Vicious Lies and Dangerous Rumors’ make it seem like without a counterpart, Big Boi is only able to bang and smash, instead of throttling back and displaying a more modest and funky flow. Ironically enough, the post-Outkast piece I liked the most wasn’t even his own, it was Wick-it The Instigator’s Black Keys mashup-tape ‘Brothers of Chico Dusty’.

His newest project goes on in the mashup-genre. In ‘Mashup Mondays’ he mixes own work with eighties tunes, resulting in some brilliant stuff. A-ha’s Take on Me and Paul McCartney’s Mrs Vandebilt blended well with A$AP Rocky and Kelly Rowland, but the rework of Stevie Wonder’s Part Time Lover pleases me the most. Kid Cudi’s chorus fits right in the up-tempo funk, but most hopeful of all, it might just make Big Boi realise that he doesn’t need to bang to recapture his Outkast magnitude.

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Todd Terje – Johnny & Mary (feat. Bryan Ferry)

With Johnny & Mary Todd Terje teaches us nineties kids a little history lesson. 1980, Robert Palmer records the song for his album ‘Clues’. It didn’t go big immediately, but as it became the tune for a series of Renault commercials, its prestige established slowly. A tradition of cover editions started, and led along the likes of Tina Turner, Placebo and Status Quo. 2014, now, a new addition to this tradition has become fact. None other than Norwegian disco-adept Todd Terje is responsible.

In contrast to earlier adaptors, Terje doesn’t pull the work completely into his own field of play. If that was the case, we would hear an upbeat disco rendition like Inspector Norse - which would be fine, I love that track – but this version lies somewhere between Terje and the original, with a much more interesting result. Turning the tempo down into a floating slow-mo, the sound reminds of Palmer’s contemporaries Vangelis. With Roxy Music singer Bryan Ferry as his Demis Roussos, Terje implicitly refers to this age. And while Ferry’s old voice reminds us that this age is long gone, this wonderful version of Johnny & Mary proves that there is still reason to keep it alive.

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Swetshop Boyz – Benny Lava

When asked to explain my fascination with Heems, I would probably begin by explaining his great feeling for clever irony. The borders of this skill were tested and crossed in his Kool A.D.-partnership Das Racist, where cheeky wordplay and ridiculously lazy lyrics brought the collective to great acclaim. The Heems mixtapes that followed Das Racist’s unfortunate break-up maintained the sarcastic stylistics and nothing was safe for its ridicule, not even the protagonist himself. This denial of seriousness is also visible in his newest release, where he teams up with UK-promise Riz MC to become the cleverly named Swetshop Boyz. In Benny Lava the two rap about being as hot as the homonymous Buffalax-meme. I would state that this is hilarious, and you would agree.

In doing so however, I would almost forget to tell you about an other, not negligible part of Heems: his persistent class. He’s a skilled rapper, besides cheeky, his rhymes are original and his flow spot on. His style is recognizable; his voice is one that draws attention. Same story for this Benny Lava team-up: the Ryan Hemsworth beat is a great themed pick, the energy is everywhere and Riz MC proves to be a great match.

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Ratking – So Sick Stories (feat. King Krule)

At 200 Words we write about almost everything King Krule releases. Taking this into account, it’s not surprising that we write about Ratking’s new video for So Sick Stories that features King Krule. But this time King Krule isn’t the point of attention, but the excellent hiphop collective Ratking. They are on almost every blog’s radar since they released their debut single Wikispeaks. There isn’t much information about the XL recordings-youngsters. They come from New York but they sound anything but New York-ish. They have a dark and sombre sound, that sometimes reminds me of Cannibal Ox’s ‘The Cold Vein’ mixed with a more East Coast boom bap sound.

Their debut EP ‘Wiki93′ wasn’t that consistent and special, but as a first feat of arms it was exciting. Their recently released songs, of their upcoming debut album ‘So It Goes’, really sound like these guys are up to something big though. So Sick Stories confirms this – even if King Krule wouldn’t participate: it is an outstanding hiphop track. The production is perfectly vile and the raps are aggressive and ambitious. Despite the track would suffice without King Krule, the London-based singer actually is the perfect addition on the chorus.

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Ben Khan – Youth

On the weirdest moments I have the sound of a trumpeting elephant in my head. With this eccentric and intrinsic part of the song, Ben Khan’s Eden will probably swing my skull into eternity, and will never cease to amaze me. It’s this bold use of sounds that caught my attention, and rocketed Khan into the appreciation of many others. As the song rapidly swooped between the rolling guitar licks, the deep synths and the elephant’s cry, the class remained steady. There was something about the tracks that succeeded Eden though. Khan seemed blocked. Aiming to recapture the schwung of his biggest hit, all he came up sounded like bad imitations of himself. Had Ben Khan expired so quickly?

New track Youth proves he didn’t. In comparison to most of its predecessors, this is a more complete song. The rolling guitar licks stayed, but are no longer interrupted by different sounds. More than that, this is a thematic composition, a melody that you could hum along to. Fortunately, the inheritance of Eden is still audible. The rhythm kept its choppy groove and retained its fragmented nature. It has more of a direction now though, something you can hold on to. Sadly, Ben Khan had to renounce the elephant to do so, but it has made him a better artist.

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tUnE-yArDs – Water Fountain

It’s hard for musicians to maintain a distinctive and unique sound. Everyone has access to the internet that makes music travel faster and there isn’t a single sound that does not get copied by other musicians. Artist like Jai Paul and James Blake once created their own sound, but as soon as it reached the masses, the sound got copied too. Understandable: they make great music. tUnE-yArDs is one of the few artists that still is one of a kind. They invented their own genre with their second album ‘Whokill’, released in 2011. The sound is a mixture of African polyrhythms, heavy bass-lines, cutting and pasting, and a vocalist with an incredible reach.

‘Whokill’ was one of the most remarkable albums of the year. Since that release I almost never heard anyone come close to the sound of tUnE-yArDs. New song Water Fountain is exactly what you would expect. The ‘Whokill’-sound is there, but developed further. Rebellious rhythms, exuberant vocals, heavy bass-line, weird ad-libs and some noise here and there. The perfect rampage music for you hyperactive days. I cannot wait for the new tUnE-yArDs album ‘nIkki nAck’, and the always incredible live shows that will follow.

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D/C – Daughter, Daughter

42 days. With a track being that old we usually don’t take our time to write about it. We often feel stupid for not seeing the song earlier. We feel sorry that we slept on it, or did not share it with you. Now I found a track – actually I found two – and couldn’t help myself: I couldn’t let this slip and you ought to thank me after hearing it. The reason I feel I can stll share this with you is the fact that D/C still is relatively unheard. He got blogged about, but the play count stopped at 4521 which is way too little for a track like this – especially after 42 days.

D/C is a British songwriter and an incredibly gifted singer with two original tracks under his sleeve. His accent is as British as it gets, and as soulful as we like it. Combine that with witty lyrics – about a dad complaining to his daughter that she’s dating a musician – and modern electronic production and you get a recipe we can not dislike, or even ignore. Daughter Daughter is everything I want in a soulful alternative pop offering and more, so keep your eye on D/C.

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Teemong – Where Will We Go

I’m a sucker when it comes to omni-creatives, artists that do not confine themselves to one field of play, but manage to put their creating qualities into work in all kinds of media. Donald Glover is one of those guys, demonstrating his skill in the fields of stand-up comedy, acting and writing, all resulting in his current project of The Deep Web, a tour that covers a lot more than live music. In Holland we have our own omni-creative: Teemong. Although his identity isn’t clear, his skills definitely are. He has showed himself immensely creative in terms of satire, video-editing and directing. On his YouTube channel the borders between those fields start to fade, leaving us riddled sometimes, but always in awe of his skill.

Yesterday Teemong uploaded Where Will We Go, a four minute track featuring pushing rhythm and dreamy pitched vocals. Raking up the travel-themed electro style from the eighties, the song could have been drawn right out from the Winding Refn movie soundtrack Drive, showcasing the same musical representation of passing sceneries around miles of asphalt. It is a style unlooked-for in Teemong, who has found himself in the world of Dutch Hip Hop quite a while now. But in his classical fashion, this song is just perfect, and asks to be played again and again.

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Tame Impala – Stranger In Moscow (Michael Jackson Cover)

Covers in music get more and more appreciation in the modern music landscape. Nowadays the somewhat conservative thinking about covers – comparing the new version to the original, where the original always gets labelled as ‘better’ – isn’t that dominant anymore. It is more a creative output of musicians: what can musicians do with the structure of original songs? The creativity of the musicians becomes visible, without comparative thinking in better or worse then the original. Recently musicians like How To Dress Well – Smog’s Teenage Spaceship, Dirty Projectors  - Usher’s Climax - and Tame Impala – Outkast’s Prototype - showed the richness of covering songs. Now Tame Impala returned with a cover of Michael Jackson’s Stranger In Moscow.

I’m not a dedicated Michael Jackson fan at all, but do appreciate his work. Probably all the Michael Jackson worshippers despise Tame Impala’s cover of Stranger In Moscow due to reasoning based on nostalgia. To me it’s just a beautiful interpretation of a beautiful song, that even enriches the original song. Tame Impala didn’t do any extreme modifications to the song, but just put the song in their psychedelic style. It gives the song a new dimension that exposes the richness and endless possibilities of music at large.

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Mapei – Don’t Wait (Remix feat. Chance The Rapper)

I usually don’t look up song meanings or even lyrics. They take away the charm of a song in most cases – I remember a specific occasion where I looked up Paul Simon lyrics and the song lost the meaning it had in my mind. With rap lyrics this is different: there usually is way more behind it than I understand, in a good way. One of the rappers we’re particularly fond of at 200 Words, who also happens to be the one with the wittiest lyrics, is Chance The Rapper. Looking up his lyrics usually brings fun surprises especially if you look them on RapGenius, the site where almost all rap songs get explained line by line.

Chance and his touring band The Social Experiment jumped on blog darling Mapei’s Don’t Wait and give it a nice little remix – with an added verse by Chance as you’d expect. The result is good as you’d expect. Chance raps one of my favourite verses ever, reflecting on a long distance relationship with the playful ingenuity like only he can while also discussing more serious topics. If you take a look at the RapGenius transcription, which he partially connoted himself it becomes clear why this is so damn good without even listening.

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Frank Ocean, Mike Jones, Paul Simonon, Diplo – Hero

Get-togethers of big artists are a great way to catch attention. Converse knows that, and with their project Three Artists, One Song they’re doing exactly what the title says. Earlier Andre 3000, Gorillaz and James Murphy were drawn together to promote some shoes. As a matter of fact, they made quite a catchy song while doing it. An exception really. Way too often those get-togethers do produce interesting syntheses of styles, but lack the time and compromise to make it into coherent and refined works. It was all up to Diplo, Frank Ocean and The Clash to rob me of this bias.

I’m not sure they managed to really. Hero definitely is an interesting synthesis of the three angles, but it lacks a certain direction. The beginning is awesome. Frank Ocean’s storytelling lyrics match up brilliantly with the creative producing of Diplo. The chorus is where it goes wrong. As soon as The Clash comes in the different styles – and I’m sorry to say it – clash. The emphasis, rhythm and vibe change completely. More than a synthesis, it becomes a fragile and fragmented whole. It sounds like everyone got their piece to colour, instead of colouring one piece together. As if that wasn’t enough, the song ends with the biggest terror of all: singing children.

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Album: Real Estate – ‘Atlas’

Sometimes as a listener of music, people try to convince you of artists they like. Real Estate is one of those bands that never impressed me, whereas many people recommended me to listen to it. I gave their first two albums a shot, but it seemed a bit boring and monotonous to me. But the band’s popularity should be based on something right? After watching their latest video of Talking Backwards, I decided to give their new album a try. The impression of the video – some friends making music in the studio, doing day-to-day things – and the first sunny days in Amsterdam, made me listen to their new album ‘Atlas’.

And it is a great album, the perfect album for the upcoming spring. The sound is steady, but not monotonous like I previously suggested. The relax fiends-among-friends vibe their video radiated, is sensible throughout the whole album. It feels like a mixture of Kurt Vile’s dreaminess – also less lengthy – and The Clientele’s freshness.The album is constant, there aren’t any positive or negative outliers, the key-word is steadiness. Not only in the variation of the tracks, but also in the songs themselves. The guitars, the vocals the drums; there isn’t any domination, it’s a synthesis of mellowness.

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