Lav's Music Corner

Childish Gambino is the long term moniker of the extraordinary multi-talented Donald Glover. He was worked as an actor, comedian, writer and producer on TV shows and even a short film of his own. But one of his most popular ventures has been the music of Childish Gambino which began in the early 2010's as a snarky wordplay heavy rap persona but evolved as Glover got older. The last Childish Gambino studio album abandoned hip hop altogether in favor of a more funk and soul inspired sound om Awaken My Love . The last time Gambino made a major splash with a release however was in 2018 with the mega hit single This Is America  which fuses the worlds of hip hop with politically charged messaging and numerous instrumental switch-ups. Review By Lavender: Pretty much everybody my age grew up with Donald Glover. In middle school we all watched his stand-up comedy and downloaded DatPiff files of his early mixtapes and debut record Camp . In high school everyone started watching him on...

Algiers is a Georgia based experimental rock band who emerged earlier this decade with a unique and rootsy take on Post-Punk. There Is No Year  is their third record and looks to follow in the footsteps of their politically charged and instrumentally exciting first two records. Review By Lavender: I can't say I've been head over heels for Algiers so far. They are from my adopted hometown of Atlanta and play an explosive brad of post-punk that I enjoy. Their records are both solid and I like plenty of the bands tracks but as a whole I thought the records were good, and just that. After some inconsistent singles leading up to the album I had a feeling we were heading towards the same kind of release, but There Is No Year  may be the weakest of Algiers three good records. The lead single Dispossession  absolutely rules with a dominating lead vocal performance that emerges from rapid fire melodies across the track. The instrumental is driving and intricate with a bac...

Lil Skies is yet another in the line of emerging trap stars who had moderate success with two big singles in 2017 Red Roses  and Nowadays  and scored his biggest hit to date with i the lead single to his second studio album Shelby . Riding a similar wave of many of his contemporaries Lil Skies needed to find a way to separate himself and give people a reason to listen while the spotlight was still on him.'' Review By Lavender: My expectations for this album were admittedly not very high, Skies first album Life Of A Dark Rose  was decent but very forgettable and despite being a hit the big single for Shelby which came in the form of i  is one of the least essential hip hop songs I've heard all year and unfortunately Lil Skies proves on this album that he is exactly who we all thought he was.  So let me jump into a handful of the problems that plague this album from start to finish. Starting off with the fact that far too many of these songs are obvi...