City Vibes

 |  July 29, 2010

Artist: Drake

Album: Thank Me Later

Rating:

“All the world’s a stage…” is one of my favourite quotes from literary talent Thongchai McIntyre (Bird). But even the Bird couldn’t match the intricate lyricisms of twee Tempest ‘Drake’ and his heartfelt odes to hip hop and R&B. Niminy piminy rap may be a rare animal, but it has been tamed by Drake in his quest to bring refinery to the brash, chauvinistic world of the shouty men and their big-dicked beat ballads. It’s not all goody gumdrops however and Drake knows when to flex a mean lyric to keep up appearances, but overall this is smooth, well produced cack that will be popular in mediocre clubs everywhere.

Artist: Emeralds

Album: Does It Look Like I’m Here?

Rating:

At last, something to get hard about this month in the form of Emerald’s new avant-garde release. If Eminem and Drake are the dick and balls of the music world, then Emeralds are the medulla oblongata. Innovative, dark, swirling and unpredictable, ‘Does it Look Like I’m Here?’ is a journey into the stratosphere of string experimentation and linearity. You can’t dance to this, but you can’t throw up to it either, it’s just a beautiful dream full of melodic sumptuousness and teasing textures and when you wake from it you’ll wish all music was this ingenious and creative, but it’s not so go back to sleep.

Artist: Eminem

Album: Recovery

Rating:

No need to psychoanalyse the toy box lyrics on this pubescent mattress stain of ineptitude. Recovery has all the subtly of a Thai game show, with each track representing one of the square adverts behind a beatnik host who vaults platitudes into the ears of senseless, clapping consumers. The music is the ostensible ‘game’ with beepy beats and dinky rhymes drowned out by the noise of the flamboyant front-man. If Recovery is anything to go by, Eminem’s future is in game shows rather than music, such is the blankety-blankness of this limp offering, the musical equivalent of an over-cooked CP sausage.