Lav's Music Corner

6LACK is an Atlanta based R&B and trap artist who has enjoyed a massively successful ride to fame that balances cult like devotion from fans with mainstream success and marquee features. It's been two years since his popular sophomore record East Atlanta Love Letter  and after a steady diet of features he has treated fans to this 6 track EP for his birthday.  Review By Lavender: While I wouldn't necessarily call 6lack's last record critically acclaimed it certainly received more positive attention than some of his moody trap singing contemporaries which included a pretty positive review I gave the record. Going into this EP all I was hoping for was that 6lack could cohesively capture sonic and thematic vibes as effectively as he had on his last album and for the most part he pulls it off.  The EP had two singles dropped in the lead up to its release and I think both are decent. ATL Freestyle  is the better of the two and it kicks the EP off. 6lack recounts his origins a

Dirty Projectors is a long running indie project centered around songwriter and multi-instrumentalist David Longstreth. The project has gone though numerous sonic transitions and line-up changes over the years but has set out on a 5 EP series each featuring a different vocalist, of which Flight Tower  is the 2nd. Review By Lavender: I have always been a big Dirty Projectors fan and earlier this year was no different when I heavily praised their Windows Open  EP. In comparison this new project which features Felicia Douglass of fellow indie project Ava Luna on vocals transitions from the folk inspired sound into a much more electronica and R&B direction. Even with this change though Dirty Projectors once again manage to put together a short but beautiful series of tracks that are just as rewarding as Windows Open .  The EP opens up with the song Inner World  a beautiful indie folk cut that sounds straight out of 2009 and would blend in more with the last EP than any other songs here

City Girls is a Florida based hip hop duo that consists of MC's Yung Miami and JT. The pairs single Act Up caught fire in 2018 and after they got a Cardi B cosign on their debut record and a spot on Drake's mega-hit In My Feelings they have gained a very high profile in hip hop over the last year.  Review By Lavender: City Girls entered the world of hip hop which is so universally dominated by strong attitudes and showed how stellar their personalities are while putting the industry on notice. While I loved some of their early singles I thought their debut record was just okay as the production ran pretty standard for mainstream trap and it felt like they overlapped the same territory a few times. On City On Lock  the pair improve on a few things and make a pretty good record although the shortcomings can be obvious.  The highlights on this record typically do the same things right. Raunchy lyrics with a TON of personality and great bars throughout, usually placed over a banger

Smokepurpp is a Florida based rapper who emerged alongside the ever growing wave of SoundCloud rap over the latter half of the last decade. His frequent collaborations with artists like Denzel Curry and Lil Pump, who he fronts the group Gucci Gang alongside, as well as producers like Murda Beatz and Ronny J has given him a contemporary and influential sound. Despite consistent public interest in his music he has largely avoided critical acclaim with simple formulas and poor lyricism.  Review By Lavender: I'd be lying if I said I hadn't enjoyed plenty of singles from Smokepurpp over the last few years. Despite the fact that he tends to attract a little bit more genuine attention for his talent than most of his trap contemporaries both records in the Deadstar  series as well as his Murda Beatz collaboration have suffered from similar shortcomings. Not only does Florida Jit  suffer from the same problems just as heavily but it also features a lack of true highlights that makes it

Phoebe Bridgers is an LA based indie rock singer-songwriter who released her debut record back in 2017. Since then the record has received critical acclaim and she has been a part of a number of high profile collaborations that grew her profile in a major way before the lead up to Punisher . Review By Lavender: I heard Phoebe's debut record Stranger In The Alps  back in 2017 when it first came out and I thought it was a pretty decent but I could have never predicted the next three years for her. At the tail end of 2018 Phoebe teamed up with a pair of other folk diagonal artists in Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus to form boygenius and release a pretty damn good EP. The collab that really grabbed my attention however was next years Better Oblivion Community Center. A project fronted by Phoebe alongside Conor Oberst front-man of legendary 2000's folk band Bright Eyes. Not only is a cosign from an artist of Conor's caliber impressive for anybody but I also enjoyed the record the pa

Bob Dylan is a legendary singer-songwriter whose name and music is synonymous with the American folk movement of the 1960's. Responsible for records like Highway 51 Revisited , Blonde on Blonde  and Blood On The Tracks  his music needs no introduction at this point. Rough And Rowdy Ways  is his first record of new material since 2012 after brandishing a handful of covers records throughout the 2010's. Review By Lavender: Dylan's classic songs and records would take ages to cover in an introduction like this. What is almost as impressive is that since his heyday he has managed to show up and drop some solid projects well into his later years. The 90's had Time Out Of Mind  and the 2000's had Modern Times  but in the 2010's I wasn't quite as enthralled with his output. Primarily because the numerous disks worth of covers not only sold his songwriting talent short but also exhausted the well of great songs he was willing to perform. I was curious and excited to

Laura Marling is a critically acclaimed singer-songwriter who spent the last decade releasing a variety of successful folk records often with a distinct sound of experiment. After her previous record Semper Femina  became her biggest success outside of Britain she took the longest break of her career up to this point and returned with Song For Our Daughter .  Review By Lavender: While I have long been a fan of Laura Marling I never considered her to be one of the greatest artists in her very saturated genre. Despite her talent and pretty consistent output I have never totally adored a record of her, until now. Song For Out Daughter  is similarly understated in the way her previous record was but Laura manages to do so much with so little on these tracks both vocally and instrumentally that nearly every second of these short ten tracks is sheer bliss.  The first half of the record is nearly flawless going 4 for 5 with highlights. The opener Alexandra  is a twangy guitar ballad to kick t

Bibio is the long running English folk project of producer and multi-instrumentalist Stephen James Wilkinson. He has released a number of records over the past fifteen years to various levels of critical success highlighted by his break-out Ambivalence Avenue  in 2009 and his experiment with ambient music Phantom Brickworks  in 2017. Review By Lavender: Bibio has long been one of those artists that I stop to listen to pretty much every time he drops anything even though no single project of his has ever blown me away. The closest he came was with his ambient project Phantom Brickworks  and I had hoped that in the wake of that release his folk oriented music would please me more than ever before. While his last record Ribbons  was decent I think that the short but sweet Sleep On The Wing  is a better interpolation of ambiance into his sound. The record was kicked off with two singles that fit in line with much of Bibio's past works. The title track and opener Sleep On The Wing is a

Jehnny Beth is a French musician who was originally known as one half of French indie rock duo John & Jehn alongside Johnny Hostile. In the past decade she gained more interest as the front-woman of all female post-punk band Savages who released two critically acclaimed records in 2013 and 2016. Review By Lavender: Not only do I think that I was more excited for this record than most indie music fans but my excitement for the project has only grown and grown over the last 6 months or so. Not only did I think the singles were consistently interesting, but once I got a look at the liner notes of this project and saw that Johnny Hostile, Atticus Ross of Nine Inch Nails and Romy from The xx were involved in the record. Pair that with Cillian Murphy and Joe Talbot from Idles also being involved in this thing and the roster of creative talent is incredibly impressive. As a result this record is full of interesting ideas and when the songwriting backs it up the songs here are great.  We h

Hinds is a Spanish indie rock girl group who first emerged in 2016 after a name change and released their debut album in 2016 to moderate commercial success. Prettiest Curse  is the groups 3rd record and follows a string of four singles over the last year.  Review By Lavender: While I can say I've never flat out loved a Hinds record I do certainly see the appeal in the band. I thought their second album was full of solid material and my only real complaint was that the band was partaking in some huge Strokes worship. If you told me I Don't Run  was a set of Strokes songs written in the mid 2000's I would absolutely believe you because the similarities run that deep. I was hoping on this record that the band would work towards finding their own identity and you could say they did that. The moments of Strokes songwriting are dialed back on this record because the songwriting in general is dialed back, with the simplest structures you'll hear in an indie rock record all ye

Flatbush Zombies are a Flatbush, Brooklyn based hip hop trio consisting of Meechy Darko, Erick The Architect and Zombie Juice. The trio blew up off of a series of critically acclaimed mixtapes highlighted by 2013's BetterOffDead . The group has found moderate commercial success with their pair of studio albums but have yet to reach the same level of critical acclaim. The last time we heard from the trio was on last years Beast Coast album Escape From New York  alongside fellow New York rap collectives Pro Era and The Underachievers.  Review By Lavender: I've enjoyed the music of Flatbush Zombies for as long as they've been around. While I agree with most fans that BetterOffDead  is the trios best project I enjoyed their 2018 record Vacation In Hell  a little bit more than most. Pair this with the fact that the Zombies, specifically Meechy delivered some of the best highlight verses on the Beast Coast project and you get more than enough reason to be excited for new music fr

Run The Jewels is the pairing of Atlanta rapper and Southern hip-hop legend Killer Mike alongside producer/rapper and experimental rap veteran El-P. The pair first linked up on Killer Mike's R.A.P Music  album in 2012 before pairing up under the RTJ moniker the next year. The duo went on to release 3 critically acclaimed hip hop records over the next 4 years highlighted by the transcendent hardcore hip-hop modern classic Run The Jewels 2  in 2014. Review By Lavender: Just like everybody on earth I love Run The Jewels. Killer Mike and EL-P came from very different places but the sound they have crafted together is unique, hard-hitting and politically charged. From some of the most hilarious vile lyrics to the most witty and revolutionary there is no shortage of creativity between the pairing and they have been amazing on one record after another. Even with expectations as high as they are on RTJ4  the duo still manages to go above and beyond as they crafted one of the best albums on

GFOTY is a British pop singer who emerged the last decade as part of the PC Music collective making heavily thematic and character driven hyper pop music. Since she left the label she has dropped a spree of outside the box style projects, but on Ham Chunks And Wine  she not only returns to her classic aesthetic but is also writing longer songs than is typical of the project.  Review By Lavender: I can't say I've ever been the biggest fan of GFOTY even while she was attached to PC Music. She had a number of good ideas and the character of the performances was unique but I was never as into her work as some of her label contemporaries and I even skipped out on reviewing her last two projects under her own label. Given how quick this EP was being released after her GFOTV  album and that it appeared that at least aesthetically she was returning to some of her PC Music days. But while Ham Chunks  is more than willing to experiment with all kinds of different sounds, the hit rate is

Lil Yachty is an Atlanta trap rapper who first emerged in 2016 with his own very unique personality in his breakout Lil Boai The Mixtape . Since blowing up much of Yahcty's unique characteristics have been replaced with more conventional trapisms. Lil Boat 3  follows Yachty's critically panned 3rd studio album Nuthin To Prove  in 2018.  Review By Lavender: I have been pretty vocal in my insistence that Lil Boat The Mixtape  is one of the most unique and charming stylistic interpretations of modern trap music and has continued to be a favorite for me. Since then it has been kind of a mixed bag culminating in his worst release yet the generic and underwritten Nuthin To Prove . Yachty took a long time off in the greater scheme of trap music before returning with this record which I had hoped would be another good one in the line of Lil Boat mixtapes, But while the record has good fundamentals it is way too long and very little of Yachty's charming and unique personality is lef

Freddie Gibbs is a Gary, Indiana rapper who spent the last decade dropping some of the most explosive and hard-hitting rap records around, highlighted by a pair of collaborative releases with Madlib in 2014 and again in 2019. He first collaborated with California produced The Alchemist in 2018 alongside rapper Curren$y on their Fetti  project and has now surprised dropped his long awaited official first true collaboration with Alchemist on record.  Review By Lavender: Freddie Gibbs has been one of my favorite rappers in the modern day. With his hard-hitting blend of lyrically sharp and thematic bars and a knack for choosing great production. Even though he has managed to impress me with solo material plenty of times the best Gibbs projects have come when he works in tandem with a legendary producer for an entire record. Given that Freddie has worked with Alchemist effectively before and he released one of my favorite albums of 2019 I was very excited for this album the moment I first h