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fmaawards · 4 years

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Copenhagen 2020

SONG

Lady Gaga - Rain On Me (feat. Ariana Grande) 2. Halsey - Graveyard 3. Marshmello - Be Kind (feat. Halsey) 4. Dua Lipa - Levitating 5. Cardi B - WAP (feat. Megan Thee Stalion)

MALE The Weeknd - Blinding Lights 2. Harry Styles - Watermelon Sugar 3. Jason Derulo - Take You Dancing 4. Sam Smith - Diamonds 5. Justin Bieber - Holy

FEMALE Lady Gaga - Rain On Me (feat. Ariana Grande) 2. Taylor Swift - Cardigan 3. Halsey - You Should Be Sad 4. Cardi B - WAP (feat. Megan Thee Stalion) 5. Dua Lipa - Physical

URBAN Cardi B - WAP (feat. Megan Thee Stalion) 2. Jason Derulo - Take You Dancing 3. The Weeknd - Blinding Lights 4. 24KGoldn - Mood 5. Megan Thee Stalion - Savage

POP Ava Max - Sweet but Psyco 2. Ariana Grande - 7 rings 3. Dua Lipa - Dont Start Now 4. Taylor Swift - Me! (feat. Brendon Urie from Panic! of the Disco) 5. Mark Ronson - Nothing Breaks Like A Heart (feat. Miley Cyrus)

NEW ACT Doja Cat - Say So 2. Tones And I - Dance Monkey. 3. Lizzo - Truth Hurts 4. Mabel - Don’t Call Me Up 5. Lil Nas X - Old Town Road

EDM Meduza - Piece Of Your Heart (feat. GOODBOYS) 2. Tones and I - Dance Monkey 3. David Guetta - Say My Name (feat. Bebe Rexha & J Balvin) 4. NOTD - So Close (with Felix Jaehn feat. Captain Cut and Georgia Ku) 5. Kygo & Rita Ora - Carry On

ROCK / INDIE Billie Eilish - bad guy 2. YUNGBLUD & Halsey - 11 Minutes (feat. Travis Scott) 3. Halsey - Nightmare 4. Lana Del Rey - Doin Time 5. FKA twigs - sad day

COLLABORATION Lady Gaga - Rain On Me (feat. Ariana Grande) 2. Cardi B - WAP (feat. Megan Thee Stalion) 3. Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello - Señorita 4. Lena & Nico Santos - Better 5. Bastille - Another Place (feat. Alessia Cara)

LYRICS Sofi Tucker - Fantasy 2. RITUAL - Love Me Back (feat. Tove Styrke) 3. The Chainsmokers - Hope (feat. Winona Oak) 4. Years & Years - Valentino (feat. MNEK) 5. Little Mix - Think Abou Us (feat. Ty Dolla $ign)

LIVE Camila Cabello - Never Be The Same 2. Jennifer Lopez - Dinero 3. Christina Aguilera - Fall In Line (feat. Demi Lovato) 4. Khalid - Love Lies (feat. Normani) 5. Liam Payne & Rita Ora - For You

CLUB MIX David Guetta - Say My Name (feat. Bebe Rexha & J Balvin) Sidney Samson Remix 2. Ava Max - Sweet but Psyco (Leon Lour Remix) 3. Zedd & Katy Perry - 365 (Jonas Aden Remix) 4. Clean Bandit - Solo (feat. Demi Lovato) Hotel Garuda Remix 5. Martin Garrix - Ocean (feat. Khalid) David Guetta Remix

SOUNDTRACK Doja Cat - Boss Bitch 2. Kygo & Rita Ora - Carry On 3. James Arthur & Anne-Marie - Rewrite the Starts 4. Kendrik Lamar - All the Stars (feat. SZA) 5. Machine Gun Kelly - Home (feat. X Ambassadors & Bebe Rexha)

BALLAD Selena Gomez - Lose You To Love Me 2. Lewis Capaldi - Someone You Loved 3. Alec Benjamin - Let Me Down Slowly (feat. Alessa Cara) 4. Sasha Sloan - The Only 5.

ALBUM Ariana Grande - thank you, next 2. Khalid - Free Spirit 3. Camila Cabello - Camila 4. Years & Years - Palo Santo 5. Troye Sivan - Bloom

VIDEO Cardi B - WAP (feat. Megan Thee Stalion) 2. Mark Ronson - Nothing Breaks Like A Heart (feat. Miley Cyrus) 3. YUNGBLUD & Halsey - 11 Minutes (feat. Travis Scott) 4. Childish Ganbino - This Is America 5. Ariana Grande - thank you, next

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firewoman-in-the-cosmos-blog · 8 years

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Album: Drunk

Artist: Thundercat

Genre: Jazz Fusion / Funk / Soul

Release Date: February 24, 2016

RIYL: Flying Lotus, Kamasi Washington, Robert Glasper, BADBADNOTGOOD, Hiatus Kaiyote, Kendrick Lamar

Best Tracks: 4, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 20,

Rating: 9/10

Born and raised in Los Angeles, California, Thundercat reigns the music industry as one of the most talented contemporary bassists-understood by his plethora of features throughout the R&B, rap, hip-hop, jazz, and soul industries. He plays the bass as if it were a guitar, with swift riffs that are almost unbelievable in their rapidity and intensity. Some of the artists that he has blessed his musical genius with by featuring on their tracks include Kirk Knight, Flying Lotus, Kendrick Lamar, Mac Miller, Erykah Badu, Childish Gambino, Ty Dolla $ign, Kamasi Washington, Vic Mensa...the list goes on. Thundercat has been recording, producing, and writing in the music world since 2002, but did not release his first studio album, The Golden Age of Apocalypse, until 2011. In 2013, he released his energetic sophomore album, Apocalypse, which I have definitely enjoyed more than the album prior, and which contains the absolute golden banger of a track, “Oh Sheit It’s X.” Two years later, in 2015, he released a beautiful, melancholy EP The Beyond / Where the Giants Roam. His newest release, Drunk, proves as my favorite Thundercat release yet, with twenty-three delicious, enticing tracks.

Drunk definitely sticks to Thundercat’s roots with its funk fusion. Certain tracks maintain an uppity beat, such as “Bus In These Streets (feat. Louis Cole),” “Blackkk (feat. Sounwave),” “Jameel’s Space Ride (feat. Louis Cole),” “Friend Zone (feat. Mono/Poly)” (my favorite track of the album), and “Them Changes (feat. Flying Lotus)” (first released on his 2015 EP). However, most tracks on the album feel slow, and almost painful in their decreased tempo. The general theme of the album is inebriation, which is made fairly clear with the album title. I imagine Thundercat intends his listeners to enjoy this album while intoxicated, as the final lyric to the 39-second opening track “Rabbit Ho” is “Let’s go hard, get drunk, and travel down the rabbit hole.” It almost seems as if Thundercat is beckoning his listeners to join him on an alcohol-included journey, where the listener dives alongside Thundercat into a rabbit hole--the rabbit hole seeming to be a metaphor for the remainder of the album. The album continues to oscillate on the topic of, you guessed it, drinking! Thundercat consistently describes situations in which he finds himself drunk throughout the album, whether he’s forgetting his wallet at the club in “Captain Stupido (feat. Flying Lotus),” discussing how “at the end of it all, no one wants to drink alone” in “Walk On By (feat. Kendrick Lamar),” living it up on restless nights in Tokyo in “Tokyo,” or struggling to “open his eyes, girl / cause’ he’s just too wasted,” in “Drink Dat (feat. Taylor Graves & Wiz Khalifa),” OR he’s “drowning away all of the pain” in “Drunk (feat. Flying Lotus).”

Another one of the album’s themes is space, demonstrated through musicality and lyrics. Thundercat creates a spacey, almost ethereal, vibe through his smooth bass riffs, his echoing and harmonizing ooh’s and ahh’s, and his expressive synths. It almost feels as if Thundercat embraces you with his bass melodies, comfortably cocooning you in his smoothness and flow in songs like “A Fan’s Mail ((Tron Song Suite II) feat. Sounwave),” “Lava Lamp,” “Jethro,” “Show You The Way (feat. Flying Lotus, Michael McDonald, & Kenny Loggins,” “Walk On By (feat. Kendrick Lamar,” “3AM (feat. Flying Lotus),” “The Turn Down (feat. Pharrell Williams).” Listening to Thundercat feels like looking through a kaleidoscope of sound--each instrument, riff, and vocal amalgamating in the tube, expanding and dwindling in energy, vibe, and feel. A thrilling funk-filled galaxy ride! “Jameel’s Space Ride (feat. Louis Cole)” more concretely and literally fulfills this theme of space. The song feels very fun and positive with fast-paced synth chords topped with fluttering synths in a higher octave; however, this joy is contrasted with the political message of the song as Thundercat sings: “I want to go right / I’m safe on my block / Except for the cops / Will they attack? Would it be ‘cause I’m black?” Track twelve “Tokyo” feels very out-of-this-world as well with its twinkling high-registered synths; the song transports you to a flattened space, as the synths sound like the soundtrack to an 8-bit video game, where everything is two dimensional.

Thundercat employs other subtly political or suggestive messages throughout the album. In “Walk On By (feat. Kendrik Lamar),” Kendrick’s irresistibly smooth verse topples Thundercat’s creamy, mellow melody, as Kendrick raps about his personal experiences growing up in Compton as a black man (and as you may or may not know, the personal is the political!). Kendrick calls out the lack of opportunity he had under the oppressive white supremacist, capitalist system in the states, and how “When the line becomes thin: be killer or fireman.” In order to survive, individuals in similar inopportune situations had to either participate in gang culture and submit to violence, or act as a “saving” member of one’s community and essentially turn against one’s community by fighting it. Through this, he alludes to the lack of stable, equitable, and community-building opportunities for young people in Compton.

The album is chock-full of comical lyrics, and the unconventionality of Thundercat’s lyricism adds to his ultimate talent and ability to work with complexity. In track fourteen “Friend Zone,” Thundercat struggles over a “bullshit” relationship in which he struggles over rejection (as he is placed in the contested “friend zone”). He tries to shake off the rejection (which he clearly feels not so nonchalant about, considering he wrote a song about it) by explaining how everything’s fine, he doesn’t need this person: “Because I’d rather play Mortal Combat anyway.” My favorite line of the song is “I will throw you in the garbage / ‘Cause you play too many games.” Oh Thundercat, you funny fellow you ! Thundercat also ends the tune “Show You the Way” with some pretty jocular and wise advice: “If you’re going to fill your water bottle with vodka, always make sure you have a friend with a bottle that actually has water in it.”

Thundercat’s fabulous repertoire of funk/jazz fusion music, along with a litany of features, is substantially enhanced with Drunk. His incredible music-making skills are explicit through his undeniable bass-playing abilities, and the overall spacey feel of this album enhances its engaging complexity. Thundercat recounts funny stories through his songs, while also making references to the political, ingraining himself as an integral voice, deserving to be listened to in the music world. The 23 tracks of the album run for a total of 51 minutes, as most songs don’t run over three minutes. I would highly recommend this album to anyone interested in rap/hip-hop, jazz, funk, or soul, but also to anyone who enjoys narrative music that is electrifying, absorbing, and largely uncommon. Thundercat’s music is not like much else I have heard, but its uniqueness is part of its overwhelming charm. So make a gin and tonic, or grab a few beers, or maybe even a J (and if that doesn’t fit your fancy then make a good ol’ cup of coffee or tea) and listen to Drunk!!

#thundercat #drunk #album review #album #review #music #flying lotus #kendrick lamar #badbadnotgood #robert glasper #kamasi washington #hiatus kaiyote

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