January album reviews

This year I want to improve the quality of my music writing so it's more than just using the same adjectives over and over again, and to do this I'm going to try and write a small review for every newly released album I hear at the end of each month. This is something that will undoubtedly get harder as the year goes along, as barely anything is released in January and Spring compared to Autumn, but hey, we'll see how it goes. The albums will be listed chronologically other than my 'album of the month' which will be at the end.

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard - Gumboot Soup

The absolute madmen actually released 5 albums in 2017, and they were all pretty great, with 'Gumboot Soup' actually being one of the best ones. The compilation-style approach to the tracklist feels refreshing considering the last 8 Gizz albums have all been concept albums to some extent, and some of their best songs yet are on this - 'The Great Chain of Being' is monstruos, and 'Superposition' sounds like a drive down a tunnel at night. Not to mention that the chilled out 'Last Oasis' and 'Beginner's Luck' are some of the best summer tunes of the year so far (Although it'll be a while before I can properly utilise them). 8.0/10

Jeff Rosenstock - POST.

'WORRY' by Jeff Rosenstock is easily one of my favourite albums of the 2010s, and following it up was always going to be difficult, and 'POST.' has given us a 'Room On Fire' situation, with an album which is still generally great but is significantly less good than it's predecessor, leaving me with the feeling it will get overlooked in time. 'USA' is maybe the best song here, along with 'TV Stars', and the shorter punch of 'Yr Throat' and 'All This Useless Energy' stand up well to 'WORRY', but the album as a whole feels surprisingly short. The 5 minute ambient outro is a major reason why, but the other issue is that 'Beating my Head Against The Wall', 'Powerlessness' and 'Melba' all sound like songs Jeff has already done better. Still, even below-average Jeff is better than almost every pop-punk band. 7.5/10

They Might Be Giants - I Like Fun

2017 was the year I really got into American oddballs They Might Be Giants, and as such I was somewhat excited for 'I Like Fun', as despite having a career that has been going on for over 30 years they are remarkably consistent, and although their recent material lacks the reckless fun from their first five or so releases, it's still pretty great. 'I Like Fun' carries this on, and although it feels only several frustrating steps away from greatness, it's definitely one of their most concise, cohesive and dark albums. TMBG have always dealt with death as a subject matter in their songs, and that is the same here, with opener 'Let's Get This Over With' and closer 'Last Wave' maybe being the best examples of this, but the real standouts are the bizarre title track - which I hated on first listen but has grown on me since, it sounds like pretty much nothing I've ever heard, like a sci-fi soundtrack with brass and extended drum rolls - and especially 'When The Lights Come On', which ranks as maybe the most sincerely sad TMBG song ever created. 7.0/10

Camila Cabello - Camila

This sounds exactly like what I expect a pop album by a girl-group member gone single to sound like, with a focused grouped tracklist of well-made but ultimately dishonest and bland pop music. 4.3/10

CupcakKe - Ephorize

I first heard CupcakKe ultra-explicit brand of hip-hop on Charli XCX's 'Lip Gloss', and 'Ephorize' is pretty much everything a fan of that could want, with clever innuendos and hilarious wordplay that relates mainly to sex, genitalia or 'stylin on the haters'. Luckily there's enough variety in the production and moods of these tracks that this album never gets boring or overly obnoxious, and other than several annoyances - the contemporary EDM instrumental of 'Post Pic' is a drag near the end of the album - but standouts 'Cartoons' and 'Cinnamon Toast Crunch' make up for it. 7.8/10

Fall Out Boy - MANIA

Oh God. This album is so bad it makes me regret how negatively I reviewed 'One More Light' by Linkin Park last year, because this is worse. Even if we pretend that the failed attempts to copy mainstream EDM and pop trends on 'YOUNG AND MENACE' and 'HOLD ME TIGHT OR DON'T'  are the greatest songs ever written, the tinny, overcompressed production is some of the worst I have ever heard, every song seems to have been finished and then turned up so high before being released that every song has become a solid block of hissing, bombastic noise. I have never like Fall Out Boy much beyond some early singles, but this is such a step down that it honestly makes 'Raditude' look like 'Pet Sounds'. 2.0/10 

Tune-Yards - i can feel you creeping into my private life

All I can say is that I don't particularly enjoy this album, the vocal-heavy style is so saccharine yet lacking in much actual catchiness or excitement, resulting in an album that feels longer than it's runtime, and becomes quite irritating. Some of the lyrical themes about cultural appropriation also rubbed me up the wrong way, and the self-flagellating 'Colonizer' seems like it was created purely out of guilt, and comes across poorly because it is a song that apologises for using african music influences while also exhibiting them. That said, this album is at least quite unique and some of the singles are well crafted. 5.5/10 

Jpegmafia - Veteran

The strangest and most experimental album I heard in January was 'Veteran' by Jpegmafia, an album so odd that even when the songs themselves might have few memorable hooks, there are enough unique production choices that it's constantly entertaining, with keyboard clicks edited to sound like trap-inspired snares and a beat made up of what I can only describe as mouth sounds on 'Rock N Roll is Dead'. 7.7/10

Migos - Culture II

This album is not only physically difficult to get through with it's frankly shocking 1 hour 45 minute, 24 song runtime, but it feels even longer due to about half the songs being so indistinguishable and boring that I can't even remember what they sound like by looking at the track name. My first listen to this was spent mainly browsing the internet because I was so bored out my mind by about 3 in every 4 tracks. My album of the month is another long, many-tracked album, but at least it has the decency to make the songs sound different, and feels like an artistic statement rather than a cynical way to get more streams, which 'Culture II' undoubtedly is. That said, the good material here is impressive, with 'Narcos', 'Stir-Fry' and the surprisingly depressing 'Gang Gang' standing out. 4.7/10

RAT BOY - CIVIL DISORDER

Something about RAT BOY really ticks me off, his voice irritates me, how derivative of Jamie T and britpop-era Blur he is annoys me and his personality seems simultaneously uninteresting and non-genuine. CIVIL DISORDER (written in all caps of course.) is his worst project yet, from the cringing lack of self awareness of  'SLAVE TO THE SYSTEM' (maybe the most generic song about revolution since 'Edge of A Revolution' by Nickelback in 2013), to the early 2010s pop-rap chorus of 'BE MY ANIME' complete with trap-flavoured hi-hats. Urgh. 3.5/10

Craig David - The Time is Now

I'm not sure if Craig David has ever made an album that could be considered particularly good, and ''The Time Is Now' is no exception, with Craig David's buttery smooth voice making little impact over increasingly tropical-house inspired instrumentals, with the KAYTRANADA produced 'Live In the Moment' being far better than anything else here. 4.6/10

Ty Segall - Freedom's Goblin - ALBUM OF THE MONTH

Observe Migos, this is how to do a double album! I'm not particularly familiar with Ty Segall's work mainly because it's not on Spotify and I'm too lazy to seek it out, but after stumbling across a stream of the album on Stereogum a week before it's official release I was TOTALLY PSYCHED DUDE!! Opener 'Fanny' is a lesson in garage rock, while 'Rain' sounds like a lost Beatles track (Perhaps ironic due to the popular Beatles B-side of the same name.). There are several extended instrumental jams on both sides of the album which fall into the sweet spot of loose enough to be exciting but controlled enough not to become too alienating, demonstrated perfectly on the extended closing track 'And, Goodnight'. I'm generally not a fan of 'throwback rock' (The Black Keys for example), but this is such a fully-realised and timeless celebration of rock in it's many forms that I can't help but love it. It's not perfect - like all double albums it could probably be cut down to a single incredible disc, but the cuts made would be more painful here than on most albums of the same length. 8.8/10