Lav's Music Corner

A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie is a New York MC who has had a meteoric rise to success starting with a prominent spot on XXL 2017 freshman list. He released his debut record to moderate critical acclaim and commercial success later that year, and followed it up with his sophomore record Hoodie SZN  which spent multiple weeks at #1 in the beginning of last year. Now after a run of singles and feature Boogie is gearing up to release his third album Artist 2.0  a sequel to his debut record. Review By Lavender: I enjoyed Boogie's debut album The Bigger Artist , it didn't blow me away but as far as trap records go I found much more of it interesting than mundane. Unfortunately I could say the exact opposite for the follow-up Hoodie SZN  which came out late in 2018 and underwhelmed me to the point of where I didn't even give it a formal review before my list week. What had me worried coming into the album was the success Boogie found with Hoodie SZA  commercially, and wondering if

Huey Lewis & The News are a California new wave band that played an absolutely essential role in the popularizing of new wave in the 1980's with hits like The Power Of Love  and Hip To Be Square.  They have released records here and there ever sense but have been on a break from new material for about a decade leading up to Weather . Review By Lavender: I will be the first person to admit that I have a soft spot for Sports  and Fore!  a pair of often overlooked new wave records that had more attention to detail and decade defining swagger than they ever get credit for. That being said the rest of their output can be pretty hit or miss and that is exactly the best way to describe Weather . When the record is good its because its groovy, funny, tongue-in-cheek and most importantly catchy. The opener While We're Young  is a kooky love song about doing it right here right now before we get any older. Aside from a bridge that is so silly its painful the track is pretty

Sightless Pit is a new experimental rock super group made up of Kristin Hayter the mind behind Lingua Ignota, Lee Buford percussionist for experimental metal band The Body, and Dylan Walker frontman of grindcore band Full Of Hell. The three musicians came together to record this industrial noise and post-hardcore record that takes a really unique approach by not including any guitars on the record. Review By Lavender: After last years expansive, unique and encapsulating Caligula  I was willing to listen to just about anything Lingua Ignota's name was attached to. Despite having never been a fan of just about anything Full Of Hell did and having an on and off relationship with The Body I was still excited for this record given the unique concept and the sheer creativity Kristin Hayter put together just last year. The lead single to this record really got me excited and it's the first song on the record here. Kimgscorpse  starts the record off interesting from its very f

Green Day is a legendary California pop punk band who released some of the most essential mainstream punk music of the 90's. They spent the 2000's dropping thematic and politically charged records that made them even more popular, but since then they have had difficulty getting their footing. After the critically panned 2012 trio of albums Uno! , Dos!  and Tre!  the band collected some good karma with fans on the follow-up Revolution Radio  in 2016 being a more true to form pop punk album, but critics still weren't convinced. Father Of All features short songs with edgy themes in the song topics and promotional material and looks to be the most true to form punk the band has been in decades. Review By Lavender: It's been a very long time since I have truly loved a Green Day record, like I'm talking American Idiot . While 21st Century Breakdown  and Revolution Radio  certainly have their moments I have long missed the youthful edge the band had in the 90's

Grimes is a Canadian electro pop artist who has transformed from a quirky girl next door into a dystopian industrialist in the 5 years since her last record. Grimes first blew up off of 2012' Visions  a critically acclaimed record that features some well received singles like Oblivion  and Genesis . She followed this up with an even more popular and acclaimed record three years later with Art Angels  but now five years out the public perception of Grimes has changed drastically, and so has the expectations for her music. Review By Lavender: I've always enjoyed Grimes music from the very first time I caught Oblivion  on an indie music blog back in the day. I used to be incredibly invested in her public persona, and the way her personality came out in her music, which made me worried after she seemed to do one sketchy thing after another in the years leading up to this record. Despite her public image I had a feeling she would return with some fantastic music and I was rig

La Roux are a British synth pop group that initially consisted of singer Elly Jackson and producer Ben Langmaid. They initially blew up in the lat 2000's off the back of their mega-hit single Bulletproof  and after a long wait due to conflict between the two, Elly released a second record for the group in 2014. Now after another long gap she is back with the much anticipated third La Roux record. Review By Lavender:  I've always had a soft spot for La Roux, starting with their simple but incredibly catchy debut record that first caught my attention on the back of some huge singles way back in 2009. I was just a touch late to being able to review the second La Roux album  Trouble In Paradise  in 2014 but it was a great natural progression that featured longer more detailed compositions that brought just as catchy synth pop sounds to the fray. I was hoping that Supervision  would be the continuation of that trend as at over 40 minutes long these 8 tracks last about an aver

Kesha is an LA based pop singer who blew up in the early 2010's off of some huge viral singles and a pair of successful albums.After a long break that included plenty of non music related drama she emerged with a brand new sound on the much more personal and ballad driven Rainbow. Now on her fourth record High Road  she looks to blend her old and new styles, and even some other sounds we've never heard from her before into a defining moment. Review By Lavender: Kesha is an artist that I've always liked just a little bit less than most people. When she was at her commercial peak she was dropping big hits, but critics we're going after the short-sightedness of her music. And given how dated some of those songs feel just ten years later proves they were right. Rainbow  was without a doubt a huge improvement but I still wasn't quite as sold as some of the critics calling the record a masterpiece. The singles were excellent sure but the record had depth issues and

Wire are a British punk band that are absolutely essential to telling the story of punk music in England. Releasing three records in their initial run the band were pioneers of art punk, post-punk and hardcore punk music. They reformed years later and have had a steady output of releases since then that interpolate numerous other genres but have never quite reached their initial highs again. Review By Lavender: This feels like a review I end up writing time and time again. A band that got off to an incredible start and whose first few records you should absolutely familiarize yourself with if you haven't, but have become middling as the years have gone by. I didn't hate their last record 2017's Silver/Lead  but it is clear that the thirst for innovation the band once had has been traded out for a more comfortable sound as they've aged, and that has never been clearer than on Mind Hive . The record isn't all bad though, but even its highlights can be middlin

Pet Shop Boys are a legendary British dance music duo who have been pumping out hits with semi-regularity since the 80's. The pair have held onto their strongly 80's inspired brand of synth heavy dance music over the years and after a few singles Hotspot  seems like it will be no different. Review By Lavender: Pet Shop Boys have a special place in my heart that stems from their initial run of records. The four albums they dropped from their debut 1986's Please  up to 1990 Behaviour  is more than enough to justify their legend status, but they continue to drop records I enjoy here and there. Their 2012 record Elysium  surprised me with how fresh and catchy it was but since then I haven't truly been impressed with the bands last two albums. I was hoping coming off of the decent Super  in 2016 the band would work their way into some great tunes, but Hotspot  sees them with less inspiration than ever before. The record isn't all bad and there are some places fo

Tame Impala is the Australian psychedelic rock and pop outfit of singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Kevin Parker who emerged in the first half of the 2010's as one of the premiere indie bands. The bands 2012 record Lonerism  went down as one of the most critically acclaimed rock albums of the decade, but their 2015 record Currents  paired with its mega-hit The Less I Know The Better  became a massively successful commercial album and shot the band into super-stardom. Kevin took an extended break before finally gearing up to release a follow-up record and here five years later we have The Slow Rush . Review By Lavender: This is my most anticipated album of 2020, there is just no question about it. Tame Impala got off to a great start with the innovative and explosive Innerspeaker  in 2010 but two years later they entered the stratosphere. Their sophomore record Lonerism  is one of the great modern rock albums and just last month I called it my 8th favorite album of t

Mark Kozelek is a long running and prolific American singer-songwriter who fronted Red House Painters in the 90's and continues to front Sun Kil Moon to this day. He has released music increasingly frequently since 2016 and dropped two full length records last year, with even more potentially on the horizon this year. This is a sequel to his collaboration with Ben Boye and Jim White from 2017. Review By Lavender: My love for Mark Kozelek's music is no secret, just last month I listed two Sun Kil Moon records, 2014's Benji  and 2016's Common As Light And Love Are Red Valleys Of Blood  on my best albums of the decade list. And last year Mark's collaboration with Petra Haden of The Decemberists fame landed in the top 15 of my favorite albums of the year. I don't really consider the first in this series among Mark's best work but I was excited for the sequel nonetheless. With more indulgent songwriting than ever before and a continued insistence on stripp

Mac Miller was a California based rapper, singer, songwriter and producer who passed away in 2018 at just 26 years old. Circles  is a project he was in the midst of creating at the time of his passing and the record was finished by its executive producer Jon Brion who tried to best complete the album to Mac's vision. Review By Lavender: It is always a difficult tightrope walk critiquing the work of an artist that has passed. Both to avoid sounding disrespectful to their legacy as well as trying to gauge how much of it was their own artistic intent verses work done on the record after their death. Mac Miller was by all accounts an absolutely great dude and his death is a tragedy that I wish could have been avoided just as much as anyone else. This doesn't change the fact that I was never really that big of a fan of Mac, I thought his 2013 record Watching Movies With The Sound Off  was decent but since he moved to a major label it had been one disappointment after another

Unlocked is the new collaborative EP from Florida rapper Denzel Curry and one of raps hottest producers Kenny Beats. The EP dropped with no singles attached to it and serves as the music behind a backing visual that saw the two downloading themselves into the internet to chase after leaked songs. They also claim that most of the beats and all of Curry's verses were recorded in just a 24 hour span. Review By Lavender: I am typically somebody who doesn't love these types of projects. Artists will take a shotgun approach to recording music and drop the output giving the project a unique story behind it, but the music often suffers as a result. I was more than willing to go into this project with open arms given that Denze and Kenny are both immensely talented and I've enjoyed so much music from them both in the past few years. Despite this Unlocked  suffers from some of the same pitfalls as records of its type tend to, though the two artists talents manage to shine thro

Against All Logic is the alias that electronic music producer Nicholas Jarr introduced in 2018 to release house music he had been assembling sporadically for years. After his first record 2012-2017  covered a five year span the follow-up came much quicker less than two years after the album that preceded it. Review By Lavender: After not enjoying Nicholas Jarr's 2015 record Sirens  as much as most people I didn't expect him to drop not only my favorite of his projects, but one of my favorite electronic music albums of the entire 2010's with his very next drop. 2012-2017  came out of nowhere to be one of the most refreshing and thrilling house records I've heard in a long time. Given the time span the record was made over I had a feeling we wouldn't hear from this moniker for a long time, maybe ever again. But to my surprise Jarr announced an EP from the project, followed by this full length album the very next weekend. The EP took a wildly different approach

Lil Wayne is a name that needs no introduction at this point. One of the most influential rappers of the 2000's who continues to release solid material and is coming off of the long awaited Carter V  one of his most acclaimed projects in years. Review By Lavender: I think I'm about as much of a fan of Lil Wayne as everybody else is. His big radio hits and hugely successful mixtapes soundtracked some of my younger years but he still manages to surprise me every once in a while with a record like The Carter V  which had way more great songs than duds. Given that the record had no true singles I didn't know what to expect going into it, but at a daunting 24 tracks and 80 minutes in length the only thing definitive about Funeral  is that absolutely nothing was left off of it. The album actually gets off to a pretty hot start with its first couple tracks. Funeral is the opener and the title track where Wayne opens up with a short sung passage before the heavy beat drops

Torres AKA Mackenzie Scott is an American singer-songwriter who first emerged with a self-titled record in 2013, before really breaking into the indie scene in 2015 with her second album, the critically acclaimed Sprinter . After a three year gap of releases, the longest of her career so far, she has geared up to drop Silver Tongue  her 4th record on the back of 4 singles over the last two years. Review By Lavender: Like many people I first fell in love with Mackenzie's music when I first heard her breakout 2015 record Sprinter . A unique and captivating piece of indie folk that saw her garnering critical praise for her expert lyricism and emotional songwriting. Unlike many though, I saw her through on a big stylistic shift into her third record Three Futures , a personal favorite of mine albeit one I can understand why some people didn't quite take to. The sound of her music just got so much more interesting to me as she introduces punchier anthemic percussion and space