Father John Misty Writes Civilization's Obituary with 'Pure Comedy'

There will be no casual audience for Father John Misty’s latest studio album Pure Comedy. Any time appropriate for listening to the album will not be spontaneous, brief, or passive. The headiness associated with any Father John Misty release is multiplied here by an unverifiable amount of times over and any recommendation of Pure Comedy for listening should be accompanied by an obligatory warning: this album is not a comforting experience. It would be nice to have the romantic jest and the lush sounds of I Love You, Honeybear (Sub Pop, 2015) rehashed as a therapeutic remedy to 2016. But that is not what we need and that is not what Father John Misty is interested in. As we toil with the consequences of an election year gone awry and ready ourselves for the consequences of upcoming developments, how can we approach art, life, or anything with leisure?

On Pure Comedy, Father John Misty (née Josh Tillman) tackles everything between political antichrists, the digital human experience, heavy-handed religiosity, and warring ideologies. The album is simultaneously a self-interrogation and an interrogation of the broader public’s role in enabling the current state of the union. But the questions that Tillman dares to ask are amorphously oblique and daunting. “Has commentary been more lucid than anybody else?” the protagonist asks on single “Ballad of the Dying Man.” Tillman’s choice of subject matter is certainly ambitious, but it is appropriate and well-deserved for him to take on. He dares to confront the most difficult questions looming over the nation, forgoing an altruistic or omnipotent approach for one that is genuinely vulnerable, concerned, and ultimately limited by his humanity.

Tillman’s signature backhanded humor is almost exclusively sarcastic on Pure Comedy, in contrast to I Love You, Honeybear’s facetious moments. Pure Comedy focuses a critical lens on modern society’s cultural practice, socio-political choices, and value set. “Bedding Taylor Swift / Every night inside the Oculus Rift / After mister and the missus finish dinner and the dishes” goes the opening lines to “Total Entertainment Forever.” Tillman’s criticisms are unsparing and pessimistic, a fitting match to the balladic tone of the album’s instrumentals. Melancholic pianos form the foundations of nearly every song on Pure Comedy, achieving a quality comparable to any Carole King-James Taylor collaboration on “Ballad of the Dying Man” and a Billie Joel theatricality on “Total Entertainment Forever.”

The album becomes a manifesto at its longest and most epic moments. “Leaving LA” and “So I’m Growing Old on Magic Mountain” clock in at 14 and 10 minutes respectively. The songs take listeners on a real-time tour of Tillman’s disgruntled headspace as he commutes from his home to the highway and convey the unsatisfactory and fleeting experiences of life in Los Angeles. In these songs, listeners will find themselves introspectively protracted. They are the negative spaces to an album densely packed with lyrics that offer more questions than answers concerning humanity's current condition, but not for a lack of trying to ascertain resolution. 

Through Pure Comedy's satire, Tillman does his best to offer solutions to the world’s problems, but he does not pretend to know the answers to all of them. He has no qualms about identifying societal shortcomings and challenging listeners to question whether or not they have been complicit with the regression of society’s development. He laments the ways in which our aspirations have incurred woeful externalities, telling Zane Lowe “When the internet came out it was like, this is the truest form of democracy that human beings have ever invented, this is gonna be the utopia. And you fast forward and it’s pornography.” Pure Comedy is a sobering experience and a memorandum outlining the faults in our current condition as a society and species. For some, this album will reek of an artist taking himself too seriously, but this is a gravitas that deserves applause. When was the last time you put yourself on the line by voicing your complaints? Did you try to solve them afterwards too?

Drake Sets Masterfully Curated Ambience on 'More Life'

Early talk of Drake’s More Life project offered the public no refuge from the nuisance of semantics, which confronts us daily with such annoyances as “alternative facts” where matters of legitimate constitutional and socio-economic interpretations didn’t already have us preoccupied. The predicament: if an artist assembles a compilation of new music, does it constitute an album? Drake disagrees, categorizing More Life as a “playlist” as opposed to a mixtape or LP. But More Life bears more of the eschewed categories’ qualities than Drake gives credit. Like an album, More Life consists completely of new material and establishes a tone and ambience in the ways of a mixtape (at least as those of the Reagan-era understood mixtapes). But granting Drake his agency to categorize his work, More Life still falls short of his grandiose promise to “provide a soundtrack to your life.” He provides us instead with a calculatedly mood-setting compilation bookended by shows of his mastery.

More Life suggests itself to be a platform for Drake to further exercise his fascination with dancehall and trap, as well as his longstanding love of Timbaland and Aaliyah. At its worst, it comes off as a collection of Views’ B-sides, but it succeeds in its moments of strong likeness to Drake’s OVO Sound Radio show (Apple Music). The collection is masterfully curated with consistent tone and easy transitions, while DJ monologues between various songs fortify the radio show aesthetic. As always, Drake’s rapping is tight and well-paced, but with such a lengthy release (clocking in at one hour and 22 minutes), he runs the risk of exhausting his limited but profitable subject matter.

On many songs on More Life, including “Get It Together,” “Madiba Riddim,” and “Blem,” Drake conveys his tried and true sentiment that love is hard without expanding upon that sentiment in new ways. The repurposed Stevie Wonder harmonica solo previously featured of “Doing It Wrong” (Take Care, 2011) deals a near fatal blow in regards to giving the album a recycled and unthoughtful feel. But More Life navigates past this with the single “Passionfruit,” a delicate dancehall-inspired R&B song built upon bouncy steel drums and synths. The sequence speaks to overall dynamic of More Life, passé at times but not for periods long enough to make us forget how Drake ascended into a position that would grant him the agency to release a “playlist.”

The most memorable moments of More Life are Drake’s skillful collaborative plays and his returns to his vintage introspection. Closing song “Do Not Disturb” evokes Drake’s mixtape heyday and his Thank Me Later/Take Care “tough-guy-feels-too” persona. The raps on the track are genuinely retrospective, lacing sentimentally provocative tales of fake Chanel gift-giving over a percussion-incessant R&B instrumental. Drake demonstrates a newly expanded music worldview with contributions from South African producer/DJ Black Coffee and British grime artist Giggs. He and Kanye’s interlocking verse on “Glow” yield hip-hop braggadocio gold and Young Thug delivers a flow-perfect verse on “Sacrifices” and radio-ready chorus and ad libs on “Ice Melts.”

Taken as a work intended for establishing ambience, both casual listeners and dedicated fans of Drake will find More Life as more than enough to sustain them until his next release. Though Drake’s classification of More Life as a playlist forces us to consider it separately from the studio albums comprising his catalog, it is hard to deny that Drake has logged another win for himself in releasing a compilation that meets his purpose of providing listeners an experience that pairs well with the many swings of life, from the mundane to the exceedingly hyped. 

Sampha Scores With Beautifully Textured 'Process'

Prior to the release of Process, most understood Sampha’s voice to be more of a texture than as a vehicle for delivering provocations of thought. Breakthrough features on “Too Much” from Drake’s 2013 album Nothing Was the Same and more recent work on Solange’s “Don’t Touch My Hair” (A Seat at the Table, 2016) showcase Sampha’s vocal rasp and urgency as emotionally captivating accents. But there are concerns that predispose those who take on the consideration of Sampha as a solo artist: Can his singularly textural voice stand as a centerpiece for original work? Or is he doomed to be the most desirable complimentary artist in alternative R&B?

Process seizes the essence of Sampha’s beautifully affective voice. The album weaves his soulful baritone into intricate layers of electronic blues and acoustic rhythms, embedding Sampha’s vocals into synthetically and naturally ambient sounds in an organic synthesis. The tone of the songs alternate seamlessly between lush and minimal as the album swells from bare and vulnerable songs like “Take Me Inside” to the thundering bass staccatos of “Under.” In whole, the palate of the album is impressionistic, dabbling in forceful whips of synthetic oscillations and the delicate strokes of sustained piano arpeggio.

The scope of the subject matter on Process is wide and highly emotive, ranging from stories of surrealist disillusions of violence to laments of forlorn love. “Blood on Me” tells of hooded figures in pursuit of a bloodied protagonist. Its instrumental is simultaneously threatening and empowering. Its vocal percussion and ominous piano arpeggio corners the listener, compelling him or her towards some sort of life-saving action with a sweat-inducing degree of invigoration. Changing pace nearly halfway through, the album frames its single “(No One Knows Me) Like the Piano” between sounds of thunderstorms and a tranquil rainforest. The song inspires sentimentality and nostalgia through lyrics that pay homage to childhood and a piano section so classical in its structure that it is reminiscent of a child’s recital.

Sampha’s idiosyncratic vocal delivery does not muffle the potency of his incisive songwriting. The precision and variety in his songs’ lyrical matter compare to the provocativeness of his earnest croons. His brand of experimental R&B qualifies him as a peer to James Blake, although Process’s melodic nature earns itself a catchiness that wins over fans in a way that the masses would never respond to Blake, especially with his recent work. This understanding of the formulaic, yet subtle and unique, nature of Sampha’s production ultimately leads us to consider the album’s title, which flaunts Sampha’s control over his art. He is an artist with an ear for what wins listeners and a direction that circumvents the monotony of R&B’s most vacuous motions.

In response to the question of whether or not he can stand out as a solo artist, Sampha has demonstrated that he does best not in fashioning himself as the centerpiece of experimental R&B music, but in elevating every element of his music to a full-bodied and alluring creative experience. Process gets contemporary R&B music right in a way that many of his competitors have not. In his first bloom, Sampha refines coarse notions of soulful experimentalism and tests the standard for modern black art. 

Father John Misty Evokes James Taylor on Second 'Pure Comedy' Single "Ballad of the Dying Man"

Having once cut a festival set short to share his pessimistic assessment of the world with his audience, Father John Misty now continues his line of questioning more musically, asking, "And had he successively beaten back the rising tide / Of idiots, dilettantes, and fools?"

"The Ballad of the Dying Man" follows "Pure Comedy" as the second single from forthcoming album Pure Comedy (due out April 7 via Sub Pop) and narrates the death of a critical man and how his commentary and analysis of the world and its politics fade into obscurity. The song's subtle instrumental pairs piano melodies and acoustic guitar rhythm as well as any Carole King-James Taylor collaboration while Josh Tillman's lyricism provokes a reassessment of cultural values and political practice. Listen below.

Taken from the new album Pure Comedy, due 7th April 2017 on Bella Union Pure Comedy is available on limited edition deluxe coloured 2LP with a free bonus 7", Standard 2LP & CD via the Bella Union store...

RTJ Return with the Politically Antagonistic and Ominously Tense ‘Run the Jewels 3’

At the culmination of one of the most culturally and politically confounding years in American history, one thing remains obvious – Run the Jewels’ feverish energy is capable of sustaining the duo as hip-hop’s foremost political tour de force. Their relentless energy aside, the past year has undoubtedly taken its toll on rapper/political activist Killer Mike and his cohort El-P. While the fervor and angst which marked the genius of their breakout album Run the Jewels 2 has maintained, this energy has taken new form. Whereas Run the Jewels 2 was the left-wing cynic’s cathartic explosion, Run the Jewels 3 is about the turbulence of tension swelling beneath the surface of a brooding and uncertain political moment.

The rap duo’s third eponymous installation is a thesis on their politics, brimming with the sarcasm and humor that colors their wit and socio-political consciousness. Lyrically, Killer Mike and El-P are pristine, emphatic, provocative and earnest. Replete with impressive internal rhymes, their verses alternate with the same chemistry they discovered in their sophomore release and they communicate their ideas with an urgency as volatile as the political change of guard. RTJ3 begins with “Down,” a lament of the impoverished conditions of their lives prior to RTJ’s success. The song’s woozy synth instrumental feels spatially distant and pairs well with the dreams of socio-economic ascension sung in the chorus: “But even birds with broken wings want to fly.”

The song precedes the album’s first-released single “Talk to Me,” which garnered wide-spread notice for its pointed insults: “Went to war with the Devil and Satan / He wore a bad toupee and a spray tan.” The sequencing of these two songs is prudent and honest; the album begins at a point of vulnerability before reinvigorating and remobilizing the audience against political corruption. “Talk to Me” recapitulates the past year’s political context while outlining RTJ’s unapologetic brand of politics. “Born black / That’s dead on arrival,” Killer Mike raps, “My job is to fight for survival / In spite of these #AllLivesMatter-ass white folk.”

The album’s lyrics speak generally on RTJ’s shared political outlook, but Killer Mike does not shy from the specific experiences he had while supporting Senator Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign. On “Hey Kids” Mike defends his support for Sander’s proposed tax increase on the wealthy, rapping “… got big ideas, got plans to rob / Any Rothschild living, Bill Gates, and the ghost of Jobs.” His verse on “A Report to the Shareholders" includes the lines “Choose the lesser of the evil people / And the devil still gon’ win” and “Ooh, Mike said ‘uterus' / They acting like Mike said ‘You a bitch.’” The latter refers to Killer Mike’s controversial reference to activist Jane Elliott, who said “A uterus doesn’t qualify you to be president of the United States.” Killer Mike stands firm behind the assertions he made as a Bernie Sanders surrogate and spares none from a well-crafted diss.

When Run the Jewels 3 isn’t a manifesto, it is humorous braggadocio laced into bass-heavy instrumentals that glimmer with disorienting synths. Its features are potent and carefully selected. Danny Brown begins the new year as successfully as he ended the last one with the critically acclaimed Atrocity Exhibition. Brown’s eccentricity and charisma render him a perfect RTJ  collaborator and his guest feature on “Hey Kids” supplements the album’s edge and personality. Rapper Trina provides the assertive hook on “Panther Like a Panther” – a welcomed return to the riot-inciting intensity of RTJ2. Elsewhere, Kamasi Washington provides a melacholic saxophone backing to the chorus on “Thursday in the Danger Room” and Rage Against the Machine frontman Zach de la Rocha anchors the album with the closing verse on “Kill Your Masters.”

Run the Jewels 3 is such an astute examination of recent politics that it becomes difficult to imagine Run the Jewels outside the context of an election year. Their confrontational and steadfast progressivism and their crude but clever comedic sensibility yield an album that perceptively chronicles a time of uncertainty, discontent, and divisiveness. They are rap’s best active duo and best political antagonists and yet, they remain focused on the collective welfare: “Not from the same part of town / But we both hear the same sound coming,” El-P raps on “A Report to the Shareholders,” “And it sounds like war / And it breaks our hearts.” With RTJ3, Run the Jewels have captured the zeitgeist of the past election year’s hysteria. It is a call to action, a political doomsayer’s passionate monologue to an uneasy crowd, and a fire that will burn in your belly.

'4 Your Eyez Only' Sustains J.Cole's Profitable Position in Hip-Hop

“Double platinum, no features,” the adage goes. It is the latter’s absence of association, however, as opposed to the commercial success presented in the former, which has kept J. Cole from falling the way of his mixtape heyday peers Wale and Meek Mill.

As divided as most hip-hop fans are about J. Cole’s music, it is difficult not to wish him success. His humble and sincere persona, substantiated by chance encounters with him on local bus routes and his bike commute home, have rendered him the most “likable” person in hip-hop. With J. Cole we have a different hip-hop figure. Where an artist like Kendrick Lamar is likely to glean over the heads of a community which elevates the likes of Lil’ Yachty and Lil’ Uzi Vert into the upper tier, J. Cole is able to engage the masses in a discourse on politics, social issues, and virtue.

J. Cole’s prowess as a producer revealed itself well before he attained his double-platinum status. Hits like “Power Trip” and “No Role Modelz” demonstrated the work of a creative mind with an innate ability to contort the popular instrumental palate and appeal to bread-earning demands of airplay. In this sense, J. Cole has been something of an oxymoron – a hit-maker with a live performance interspersed with sermons speaking against materialism. As endearing as these qualities are in J. Cole, it is a wonder that his lyrical substance has failed to match the quality of his instrumental production or his maturely grounded worldview.

4 Your Eyez Only acknowledges the fact that J. Cole connects best with fans on a personal level. From the album’s beginning and onward, he sings with an earnestness which doesn’t indicate a strain to achieve scintillating R&B vocals, but establishes vulnerability. His raps refer onto his signature range of swaggering self-assurance and endearing portrayals of insecurity. As a whole, the album’s instrumentals are more consistent than 2014’s 2014 Forrest Hills Drive. J. Cole laces boom-bap percussions with glitch-synth accents and motifs to create a body of work that is approachable and easy. The album shows his aesthetic not as improved, but refined. Nowhere on it do we hear J. Cole relate the world to frigid temperatures with his overused trademark ad lib. Instead, we are given a more patient and well-portioned album which looks to sustain listeners from beginning to end.

Returning J. Cole fans will find themselves satisfied with anthemic hits like “Immortal” and “Déjà Vu.” The latter’s production reveals the live performance sensibility that J. Cole has picked up in his past year on the music festival circuit. The song begins and ends with a call-and-response fanplay which has the makings for great performative moments, but does little to stimulate any provocative considerations. Superficialities aside, “Déjà Vu’s” trap percussion and Rich Boi-esque post-chorus make it a mainstay for the late night car ride or commute home.

An undeniable highlight, “Neighbors” contemplates racism through an anecdote inspired by true events. Its woozy, molasses-thick instrumental evokes early A$AP Rocky while raising interesting dilemmas of black success and stereotypes. The album’s intellectual high, “Neighbors” finds itself alone as a moment of progression for J. Cole. The rest of 4 Your Eyez Only fails to match, lyrically or instrumentally, the substance of J. Cole’s close reading of race relations on the song and can at best be considered superficial, tried, and tired.

Were J. Cole to give into the fixations of luxury and excess of his lesser popular peers, he may not be as prominent a figure within the genre as he currently is. His character yields no indication of him doing so, but the risk he currently runs with 4 Your Eyez Only is stagnation. 4 Your Eyez Only provides nothing more and nothing less than what fans have come to love about his music. It shows a successful J. Cole inhabiting the profitable and comfortable place in hip-hop he has carved out for himself and does little to reinforce that position to endure the long-term.

Frank Ocean Achieves an Opus in 'Endless' and a Triumph in 'Blonde'

Regardless of how deftly Frank Ocean has eluded categorizations of his genre and sexuality, he could not escape his context. We all can be considered “products of our time,” but no artist in music has embodied such representation as artfully as Frank Ocean. From an industry perspective, Ocean has fully employed the practices of modern music business through mixtapes, surprise releases, and streaming exclusives; his professional choices are a Sign o’ the Times, as his hero Prince once sang.

But in an age of immediacy and artificiality, where modernity has rid us of the most organic components of creating art, Ocean chose to release the visual album Endless – a forty-five minute music video of three Frank Oceans constructing a staircase – to remind us of the protracted toils of creating… anything. Moreover, a five day stream of the carpentry featured in Endless preceded the album’s release. Was Ocean objecting to the contemporary culture of immediate music exchange with such a drawn out exhibition on long-winded process of creativity? Could he even protest such a thing when he himself owes nearly all of his fame and fortune to the internet? Was Ocean positing himself as an anti-generational spokesperson? No matter how long four years may have seemed, the album which broke Ocean’s hiatus forced fans to check themselves and question their impatient anticipation, and did so in a stroke of genius.

Endless is a unique multi-media presentation posing daunting, yet romantic, realist dilemmas. Time seems to be the obvious overarching subject of Endless. Its songs also explore love and hubris, but the visual platform of the album forces one to consider the focal points of Ocean’s lyrical matter in relation to the meaning behind his staircase construction. The best and most eloquent example of this is in the song “Wither,” in the line: “Pray [our children] get to see me wither.” The song’s minimalist instrumental brings the vocals to the forefront along with an earnest contemplation of the finite nature of life. The double entendre “see me wither [with her]” offers both a hope for long life and a desperate desire to share it with loved ones. While love forms the song’s thematic preoccupation, it ultimately becomes secondary to the protagonist’s worry of losing those he loves.

The production on Endless is highly experimental and quintessentially contemporary. Ocean incorporates rap vocal deliveries in the mode of Young Thug with highly electronic instrumentals and rapid-fire trap-style percussions. Ocean’s rap verses show a significant improvement from the verses previously released on his Tumblr. He demonstrates a greater command of cadence with bars that are less dense than previous and are more carefully spaced. A majority of the album is electronic, harkening to the style change made by Radiohead between 1997’s OK Computer and 2000’s Kid A. Ocean himself is undoubtedly influenced by the band, having incorporated Radiohead’s “Optimistic” (Kid A) as an interlude on his mixtape nostalgia, ULTRA and covering “Fake Plastic Trees” from Radiohead’s The Bends (1997) during his 2012 live campaign. Radiohead guitarist Johnny Greenwood even contributes string orchestration to the album’s opener. The stylistic transition towards the experimental alternative-electronic is a sign of maturation for Ocean who previously deferred to samples to obtain such an aesthetic.

But while Endless ventures into experimental territory, it retains the accessibility of Ocean’s singer-songwriting appeal. The album opens with a cover of the Isley Brothers’ “Let Me Know” (made famous by Aaliyah) accented with the dreaminess of Greenwood’s string orchestration. “Comme Des Garcons” and “Slide on Me” are enticingly catchy with their ascending melody and call-and-response chorus, respectively. Between the album’s most experimental tracks are minimalist R&B songs that highlight Ocean’s potent songwriting ability. Standout consecutive tracks “Rushes” and “Rushes To” evoke Bon Iver-esque composition with sparse guitar backing and alternatingly spaced and overlapping vocals. “Rushes To” offers Ocean signing at his most passionate, straining himself with exhaustive effort as he belts the closing lines of the song.

The lasting impression made by Endless is the balance between Ocean’s minimalist composition and the abstract free verse communicated through an ethereal electronic palate. He forces us to accept the new with the old, which creates a conundrum for fans who may not be able to access the album’s experimentalism. Creatively, Endless is an opus which refocuses our awareness of our humanity through an ode to love, loneliness, and desire. It is in one sense, however, a detriment to the artist.

A day after the release of Endless, Ocean released a proper LP entitled Blonde, a more accessible album which absolves Ocean of the predicament of profitability. The album opens with the luscious “Nikes,” a dizzyingly atmospheric track featuring pitch-altered rap verses which carry over the abstract content of Endless. The song transitions into a more nimble instrumental of acoustic guitar plucking layered with soaring synths. Aesthetic seems to be song’s focus. The “Nikes” music video features Frank surrounded by cars sipping the contents of a Styrofoam cup, suggestive of some codeine-infused drink. It is the perfect visual for a song that perfects the disorienting and droning hip-hop production made popular by A$AP Rocky.

The ensuing song is one that Ocean performed during his 2013 California Live, You’re Not Dead Tour. On “Ivy,” Ocean sings about a love fallen apart, the nostalgia of a blooming friendship, and the disconnect between estranged lovers. The song’s pitch-altered vocals detract from the sincerity of its beautiful lyrics, effectively conveyed through Ocean’s live performances of it. Over the high reverb of dream-pop guitars, “Ivy’s” lyrical substance seems cheapened by the artificiality of the song’s production. Ocean appears to compensate for this creatively at the song’s outro with sounds of instruments thrown around a room in the distance, accentuating the frustration expressed in the lyrics. But the mere seconds in which this frustration manifests doesn’t recompense the botching of what would have been a beautiful and endearing song.

Blonde is consistently minimalist in its instrumental arrangement. Simplistic, yet catchy, piano and Rhodes melodies on “Pink + White” and “Solo,” respectively, yield some of Ocean’s most sing-along moments. Harmonies contributed by Beyoncé featured on “Pink + White” hilariously distract listeners from the song’s message of futility.

Several songs overtly borrow lyrical elements from Ocean’s influences, the most obvious being “Close to You,” which draws both its title and chorus melody from the Carpenters’ single of the same name. “White Ferrari” borrows from The Beatles’ Revolver (1966) hit “Here, There, and Everywhere;” Ocean singing the line “Spending each day of the year” in the melody originated by Paul McCartney. In these two songs, Ocean draws from two of the most iconic and commercialized pop acts in music history. It is no wonder then that Blonde’s appeal reaches a much broader audience than Endless.

But Blonde’s accessibility doesn’t diminish Ocean’s potency as a songwriter. The album’s most heart-rending single “Seigfried” tells of a man struggling to find his fit in the world. Also performed on the California Live Tour, “Seigfried” retains the minimalist arrangement featured in its live performance, again bringing Ocean’s vocals and lyrics to the forefront. Lyrical gems “I’m living in an idea / An idea from another man’s mind” effectively invokes feelings of displacement while the closing lines of “I’d do anything for you / (In the dark)” deliver a potent sense of desperation.

Ocean makes references to several real-life friends of his across the album, giving Blonde a deeply personal and seemingly autobiographical feel. The album closes with recordings of his friends interviewed in low fidelity while a dancing synth melody creates a sense of nostalgia. Questions asked in this recording, such as “How far is a light year?” remind listeners of the simple joy of sharing the company of childhood friends. This substance found in these interview tapes is not found in the exchange of dialogue, but rather, the realization of time passed between good friends, understood in the youthfulness of their voices.

Though the dual-release of Endless and Blonde consequentially forces the two to be compared against each other – a comparison in which Blonde loses creatively but wins with fans – Ocean’s choice to release two separate albums simultaneously is remarkably brave. As we began when he first revealed his queer sexuality, we may continue to know Ocean for his courage. We have all the reason to believe in his creative direction; so far, he has yet to miss a step doing things his way.

Watch Frank Ocean's Provocative New Music Video, "Nikes"

Apple's Music's promise of new Frank Ocean material is coming to fruition as the streaming service released the music video for a new song entitled "Nikes" just one day after Frank Ocean's visual album Endless dropped on the same platform, featuring contributions from Radiohead's Johnny Greenwood, James Blake, Sampha Jazmine Sullivan, and electronic producer Arca.

"Nikes"'s music video begins with images of young people shot with various qualities of cameras before transitioning into a shot of Ocean (a car fanatic) sitting alone surrounded by cars and drinking from a styrofoam cup. From that point onward there are tributes to Trayvon Martin, A$AP Yams, and Pimp C, before descending into a sensory overload of provocative images of nude women covered in glitter, Ocean being lit on fire, and at one point even a dog mouthing the lyrics. See the (NSFW) video below and find Endless on Apple Music.

First Impressions: Notes on Frank Ocean's Visual Album 'Endless'

Four years of anticipation came, at least in part, to an end yesterday night as Frank Ocean released his visual album Endless through Apple Music - the apparent precursor to an LP proper to come later this weekend. The video, set in the same white-washed warehouse where Frank Ocean broadcasted his website's livestream last week, is roughly 45-minutes long and plays new material behind black-and-white visuals of Ocean constructing a staircase. Transverso took to pen and pad to record some initial thoughts on Endless: 

"Device Control"

• We return to the warehouse seen in Frank Ocean's live stream; an imposing, stoic voice speaks.

"At Your Best (You Are Love) (Isley Brothers cover)"

• Two impressions of Frank Ocean work away on workbenches, cutting wood on saws.  
• The song playing seems to be the studio version of the Isley Brothers/Aaliyah cover Frank Ocean released the day after Aaliyah's birthday last year. 
• A third Frank Ocean figure emerges.
• The traditional R&B lyrics of the song, paired with the images of Frank Ocean working construction, convey "love" as industrious.

"Alabama"

• Descending piano melody plays as Frank opens with quasi-rap verses. 
• Vocals come in split between the left and right channels, creating an overlapping and disorienting spatial effect. 
• Distortion on the closing vocals evokes iLoveMakonnen. 

"Mine"

• Transition between songs is quite unclear. 
• "Mine" may be an interlude or a song beginning with the forthcoming rap vocals. 

"U-N-I-T-Y"

• General note: wardrobe changes have occurred with each song.
• Rap vocals demonstrate a strong improvement in Ocean's rap delivery; his cadence is more carefully paced and restrained compared to rap verses he previously released through his Tumblr. 
• Rapping style is most kin to that of Earl Sweatshirt's slowest moments on "Doris."

"Ambience 001: 'In a Certain Way'"

• Interlude plays a record sample of dialogue (seemingly from a film). 

"Commes Des Garcons"

• Eclectic vocal delivery early on. 
• Deftly layered synths, vocals, and drum kits.
• Tempo increase after chorus leads to instrumental based on chamber drums, faint synths, and artificial snares.

"Ambience 002: 'Honeybaby'" 

• Another brief interlude features the scorching wails of a soul singer crying "Honeybaby."

"Wither"

• Noise from construction can be heard quite noticeably; one of few times, if not the first, this has happened in the video.  
• Instrumental is a widely spaced chord progression on a Rhodes. 
• Frank Ocean's vocal style and signature vocal registers seem unchanged. 
• Jazz bass-backing is faintly reminiscent of Thundercat. 

"Hublots"

• Another interlude whose beginning and end cannot be precisely determined without reference.

"In Here Somewhere"

• Non-vocalist quasi-rap into.
• Vocal layering compliments sparse synth instrumental. 
• Varying vocals may be a pitch-altered Ocean, another artist, or  a sample.

"Slide on Me"

• Slow guitar arpeggios form the foundation for this instrumental. 
• Instrumental layered with synth-bass backing and hissing and fluttering drum kit accents. 
• Vocal reemploy split-channel spatial effects.
• Ocean appears to be spray-painting rectangular boxes black; this is one of the last visuals featured on Ocean's live stream. The boxes are transferred from an aerosol protected paint room to the main warehouse. 
• Synth outro has a very ethereal aesthetic. 

"Sideways"

• Another rap verse from Frank. 
• Instrumental sputters in and out in a tremolo-style break. 
• Ocean stacks the boxes by sliding one end over a standing metal rod, forming what seems to be a staircase. 
• The steps increase in color from bottom to top; from a natural wood grain to black.

"Florida"

• Interlude featuring chorus vocals accented by layers of harmonies sung by Ocean. 

"Deathwish (ASR)"

• Instrumental features distant, distorted, high-register vocals.
• Waning synths are layered with trap-style percussion. 
• General note: Album is highly contemporary. It incorporates elements of contemporary hip-hop (Young Thug, iLoveMakonnen) without seeming fadish or gimmicky. 

"Rushes"

• Elongated strums on electric guitar form the base of this widely spaced instrumental. 
• The staircase is now approximately 7 feet tall. 
• Song features a female vocal contribution. 
• Latter end of the song features an increasing distortion on Frank's vocals. 
  • Sounds like what Kanye wished the vocals on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy sounded like. 

"Rushes/Rushes To"

• The electric guitar instrumental of "Rushes" carries over in greater distortion.
• High-tempo, bass-heavy spattering percussion.
• Electronic track serves as either the outro to "Rushes" or the intro to "Rushes To."

"Rushes To"

• Acoustic guitar instrumental.
• Song is the most minimal of the album. 
• Moments of double-tracked vocals. 
• The closing vocals feature Ocean at his most passionate; it is at the song's end that he strains his voice the most. 

"Higgs" 

• Dancing instrumental of what sounds like an electronic steel drum. 
• Slow rap vocal delivery.
• Some would consider the instrumental to be trip hop. 
• Shot closes in on Franks lower legs as he climbs the stairs. 
• The scene then cuts to the visuals featured at the beginning of the video. 

Outro

• The stoic voice featured at the introduction continues its dialogue. 
• Dialogue breaks into an avant garde garage house track. 

Notably Missing from Endless

• New songs performed on Ocean's California Live, You're Not Dead Tour (2013). 

Upon first listen, the extent to which Ocean has broadened his range of musical influences and output is truly impressive. Considering his admiration for Radiohead, the electronic palate of the new material draws a (dare I say) warranted comparison to the magnitude of growth Radiohead demonstrated between Ok Computer (1997) and Kid A (2000). Yet with all that we have been given to savor from this visual album, an additional release is reported to still be due this weekend.

The Emerging Place of Hip-Hop in the Culinary Sphere

Eddie Huang - host of Viceland's Huang's World and owner of East Village restaurant BaoHaus. (Photo: Huang's World - Vice Media LLC)

This past year, two unique television programs under the same network rocked food television with their immense popularity as Viceland’s Huang’s World and Fuck, That’s Delicious built upon the successful template established by the contemporary icon of food TV, Anthony Bourdain. The punk rock, culturally adventurous, and politically daring culinary bad-boy earned the Travel Channel degrees of edge and grit previously perceived as unattainable for the network, an especially notable feat for Bourdain’s No Reservations considering its adjacent air time to the program of lame-dad, defiler of the King’s English Andrew Zimmern. Eventually moving to CNN, who realized Bourdain’s ambitions to film more dangerous locations, Bourdain saw continued success as the host of Parts Unknown, winning four Emmys while redefining the palate for televised food and travel culture.

Both Eddie Huang of Huang's World and rapper Action Bronson of Fuck, That's Delicious have adopted Bourdain's persona as the anti-establishment host with tactful yet unembellished diction. What Huang and Bronson have revamped, to their advantage, is the aesthetic, exchanging Bourdain’s literary punk appeal for a hip-hop oriented experience with an accessible level of sophistication. This immigrant American, hip-hop devotional, and most of all, understated appeal is the primary difference between Bourdain and the two aforementioned personalities. Whereas Bourdain’s shows could easily rely on the chef’s French-style culinary training, Huang’s World and Fuck, That’s Delicious treat their hosts’ formal culinary backgrounds with subtle acknowledgement, presenting Huang and Bronson mostly as home-trained cooks/hip-hop fanatics instead.

Anthony Bourdain (Photo: Parts Unknown - CNN)

Where Bourdain, Huang, and Bronson’s shows win with audiences lies in the authenticity of the hosts. Regardless of punk or hip-hop sensibilities, the congruency between hosts’ televised and real-life personalities has risen in value as a commodity in food television. It is this element of the true-to-form host that has won Huang’s World and Fuck, That’s Delicious Anthony Bourdain’s approval. Though Bourdain’s praise does not reference either host’s character as a hip-hop aficionado, the transitioning popularity from Bourdain’s punk-framed socio-political interrogation of cuisine to the new frontier of hip-hop contextualized cuisine/culture is a trend that is difficult to overlook. And yet, the hip-hop approach to cuisine and culture makes so much sense, as much, if not more sense, than Bourdain’s brand of punk.

As Americans of Albanian-Jewish (Bronson) and Taiwanese (Huang) heritage who embrace hip-hop, the two not only attest to the cultural intermingling which occurs within hip-hop, but manifest it in their shows, and do so shamelessly. Never is there an episode in which Huang isn’t walking the streets of a Eurocentric town dressed in an oversized jersey and Jordans. Similarly, cameras follow both Bronson and his Mr. Wonderful tour supporting posse: the Alchemist, Big Body Bes, and Meyhem Lauren – a multicultural collective who accompany Bronson at all times, even if they sometimes contribute absolutely nothing to the culinary conversation. Through their shows, these hosts advocate the embrace of cultural diversity as experienced through the enjoyment of food. Their outlook exploits the parallels between hip-hop’s transcendence of racial barriers and the expansion of cultural insight afforded by travel-dining. Understanding where these two shows have placed hip-hop in relation to cuisine is best accessed through Huang’s assimilation of the two – food, like hip-hop, is a culture for outsiders who inevitably find a commonality with the broader community.

Action Bronson - rapper and host of Viceland's Fuck, That's Delicious. (Photo: VICE Eats - Vice Media LLC)

My own realization of the appropriateness of hip-hop as a platform for cultural exploration through food struck me, ironically enough, as I followed a destination-dining rabbit hole I discovered in the Montreal episode of Parts Unknown. Near the culmination of my tour de Montréal, I took a cab from the Gay Village to Little Burgundy for my second service reservation at Joe Beef, the highly esteemed feeding ground of choice for Montréalais omnivores, regarded as one of the one hundred best restaurants in the world. I read the dimly lit menu written in cursive French on the chalkboard spanning the entire left wall, extracting what the three years of French I had taken in college thus far allowed me to. I curated my choices with wild game and gluttonous excess in mind, invoking scenes of seared foie gras and copious helpings of black truffles on a table set before Anthony Bourdain and Joe Beef owners David McMillan and Fédéric Morin.

Awaiting my meal at the bar, the ambience of the bistro did its part in stimulating my anticipation. Deep cuts by Mos Def and the Roots played over table conversation, consistent with jazz-based instrumentals accented with boom bap percussion and intricate rhymes by Yasiin Bey and Black Thought. Theirs was the socially conscious and introspective lyrical matter which primed my appetite for true discovery, in this case, the best of French-Canadian cuisine as served by the most famous restaurant in Canada. The intended effect achieved, it was the best meal I’d ever had in my entire life thus far.

I began with oysters from Nova Scotia, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. My waitress Sarah, a fun, helpful, mildly flirtatious Montréalaise girl, then served an expectation-exceeding homemade spinach pappardelle with a red wine ragù and escargot. The broad pappardelle noodle attained a perfect balance between the heartiness of the pasta and the richness of the escargot ragù. “Stop trying to hide it,” Sarah told me as I twirled speckled green noodles around the prongs of my fork, “your smile is from cheek to cheek.” Next I had a venison torte whose layers of venison, foie gras, onions, and a braised anna potato fanned atop the dish were succulent in each bite, melting in my mouth with savory excess.

Anthony Bourdain with Joe Beef owners Fred Morin (center) and Dave McMillan (right). (Photo: Parts Unknown - CNN)

Joe Beef had won me over with the pappardelle, but it was the venison torte which compelled me to commit to what was unraveling as the best meal I’d ever had. Fittingly, “Juicy” began to play on the speakers, imparting a celebratory sense of triumph that could only be experienced through Biggie’s boastful assertions and confident command of cadence on the song. With my bill already nearing 100 Canadian dollars, I ordered a panko-crusted head cheese croquette with a mustard seed dijon, because (in a matter-of-fact way of phrasing it and in homage to a rap legend of my native Bay Area) I was “feelin’ myself.”

I’ve expended all words that could possibly be used to describe the head cheese croquette, mainly because it is hard to describe the denouement of a meal when the last entry isn’t quite a dessert. “I always love a bit of head cheese for dessert” Sarah joked. Fuck it, I knew what I wanted and while I’m speaking bluntly, the head cheese was damn good and didn’t disappoint.

After the meal I had an over-the-bar conversation with the host that received me at the door on who was the best rapper currently active: Drake or Kendrick Lamar. I argued for my West Coast compatriot while my counterpart presented a case for Drizzy. I was surprised that anyone would try to match Drake’s lyricism to Kendrick Lamar’s rhetoric; however, in a testimony to hip-hop’s seamless cultural fusion, I had completely forgotten that I was speaking to a Canadian. Perhaps the ambiguity of national identification would not have been the same had I been speaking to a national of a country across waters, but French-Canada was a particularly striking cultural anomaly not only for Canada but for all of North America.

I learned many things from the meal. Where politics is in some cultures considered to be a topic unsuitable for dinner table conversation, hip-hop, more than other genres of music due to its inherent accommodation of debate, can serve well as a mealtime topic of conversation. To a larger degree, hip-hop has the potential to invite people into culinary exchange the same way it has ushered outsiders into a historically African-American culture. From a music perspective, my meal at Joe Beef demonstrated the ability of hip-hop to prepare an appetite and celebrate the universal satisfaction of a good meal. Whether or not hip-hop can establish a reputation as a genre fit for curating a fine meal is left to restaurateurs across the world to determine, but I know that its potential to establish a dining ambiance is not accidental, nor is it some unnaturally-forced experimentation. I know, from passing the kitchen hallway on my way out of Joe Beef and seeing the words “CD playing” on the soundsystem monitors.

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See trailers for both Huang's World and Fuck, That's Delicious below.