Lav's Music Corner

The Loveliest Time  - Carly Rae Jepsen After releasing two of the best pop albums of the 2010s Carly Rae Jepsen established herself as the best and one of the most underrated songwriters in all of pop music. Her most recent project, last year's The Loneliest Time,  was the first time in a decade that I wasn't blown away by her material either studio albums or B-sides. Despite having a few incredibly good moments it was surprisingly inconsistent for an artist who felt like they just never ran out of good songs. Now, that album is getting a quick follow-up in companion album The Loveliest Time . While it's easy to reflexively call this a B-Side project, it also kind of feels like a more romantic answer to its predecessor. Given that has historically been right up Carly's alley and that I thought the lead single Shy Boy  was pretty good I was excited about this.  Unfortunately, the four songs proceeding Shy Boy  on the album don't add up to a ton of intrigue. The o...

Megan Thee Stallion is a Texas rapper who has been pretty much impossible to ignore over the past few years. With numerous hit songs displaying her uncompromising artistry and big personality as well as some very public dramas unfolding around her. Traumazine  is Megan's 2nd studio album following 2020's Good News  and a number of EPs and mixtapes released in the years before and since.  Review by Lav: Like MANY great artists before her Megan knows her way around a great single. Her hard-hitting performance style and creative wordplay have served her well in releasing both hit songs and critical smashes over the past few years. However, like many other great artists this hasn't really translated that well into her full-length material. Whether it's her debut album, EP's like Suga  and Tina Snow,  or mixtapes like Fever  and Something For Thee Hotties  everything that makes Megan great on one particular song fails to get stretched out to the length of a...