Cate Le Bon Photo: Ivana Kličković
Megan Thee Stallion, Fever
[300 Entertainment, May 17]
There’s a very specific energy that moves through artists who are aware that their time has arrived. Megan Thee Stallion knows she has a verifiable hit with Fever, a debut album fueled by unabashed sexuality and laced with an indelible Houston spirit. What projects the most with each precisely delivered lyric—aside from a truly chameleonic flow—is the power Megan asserts with her first major-label effort. A lyricist who learned her craft under the tutelage of her late mother, Megan constructs each verse with biting clarity as she explores her unwavering confidence and agency. “Cash Shit,” for instance, is a track that could only believably come from a person who is in total charge of themselves: “He told ’em send me a pic ’cause he miss me / I told him send me a stack if he really / I don’t be trusting these tricks ’cause they tricky / Send him a pic of somebody else titties.” Fever delivers a couple fiery collaborations via Juicy J and DaBaby, but make no mistake: Megan Thee Stallion is a star. [Shannon Miller]
Pronoun, I’ll Show You Stronger
[Rhyme & Reason, May 24]
It’s shocking to discover that Alyse Vellturo is the sole force behind Pronoun, a loud, riff-heavy powerhouse with songs big enough to swallow an arena. Vellturo’s layered vocals are emotive and muscular, and her debut LP’s criss-crossing, reverb-heavy guitar lines dovetail with thick, enveloping synths and spine-rattling percussion. There’s a satisfying hint of ’90s FM rock on booming tracks like “Run” and “Temporary Tantrum,” but Vellturo’s songs amount to more than their riffs, pleasurable as they may be. Take “Wrong,” a Swiss watch of a song that clicks each of its moving parts into place so skillfully that it ripples with an infectious momentum. That sensation rings throughout I’ll Show You Stronger, an album that, despite its searching, anxious lyrics, nevertheless resonates as a propulsive sprint into the future. Closer “Everybody Knows,” for example, finds Vellturo “trying to make some sense of things I know deep down don’t make any” against harmonies that ascend like rockets, symbolizing the indelible blend of joy and terror with which we approach the not-knowing. [Randall Colburn]
31 Comments
SHE IS THE STALLION MANG
I’d like to get that album, but I have kids–there’s not a second of it that’s filthy. I mean, if they put out a clean version, it’d just be the music.
Your kids sounds hella lame.
(Martin Starr, Kumail, and Thomas Middleditch look out at the coders)Stallions….
“The Sound” just scared the shit out of my cats. I am into it.
It’s all about the new Black Mountain.
Bought the album today. It’s weird in a good way. Like, part psychedelic trip, part stoner/hard rock. Sometimes it feels to me like some Judas Priest-style riffs with synths on top (Licensed to drive), and other times sounds like some “wall-esque” Pink Floyd sound you can phase out to…. A slightly different sounding album than their previous one (IV – that I love too), but still awesome.
I love this album. Even if you clearly can feel the influences, it has its own sound. This one will stay in my current LP rotation list for a while…
Is Cate Le Bon about to do the robot?
I tore through all of Pronoun’s releases on Spotify after I heard “Run” like a year ago, but none of their catalogue really lives up to the promise of that song. She/they remind me of Pains of Being Pure at Heart at their most bombastic – I’m optimistic about the new album.
For me, it was “Wrong”; the Audiotree Live version of that song just sounds perfect. The sound of the opening riff . . . it’s just perfect. As for the other tracks she’s dripped out over the last few months, “Stay” hooked the hell out of me, and “Temporary Tantrum” is another really good one.The album? Really good. To be fair, I have listened to her songs dozens of times prior to its release because this kind of insanely catchy pop is my thing all the way, and I’m really digging it.
remind me of Pains of Being Pure at Heart at their most bombastic
This is high fucking praise.
Flying Lotus ft. Denzel Curry on ‘Black Balloon Reprise” slaps but it was still a missed opportunity to sample the Goo Goo Dolls.
If there’s another soul on A.V. Club who watched / loved / remembered Work of Art, this song reminds me of Abdi’s piece with the exploding heads in season 1.
it’s an absolute banger, but feels like it should be on a Denzel album not a FlyLo one
Cate Le Bon is the best
Cool cool, but you forgot The Lonely Island
These were all terrible. Is this what passes for music nowadays?
When you’re almost 50 and heard so much music at this point that everything new sounds like another song you’ve heard before. Always holding out hope that a new artist will surprise you.
I dare you to give that Flying Lotus album a whirl.
This is largely true. Everything up there sounds like a retread of something from 20 years ago.
If you’re trying to go full tilt into something bizarre i’d say Clipping Sort of noise-core hip hop. The above is a song that changes time signatures every few bars and keeps a consistent rap going on top of it.On a more rock note, Grandson was able to combine Trap Hip Hop beats and a bluesy/rock and industrial flavor tinge into a wonderful palette.
Sleigh Bells has been consistently trying to do new things, of note from a previous album was this song. I love it mainly for the trick of letting the chorus slip just a few bpm slower to cause the song to lurch, which was neat: And I guess I’ll end with The Pauses, who were able to meld chiptune NES backing electronic chirps with a real grounded grunge interior. There’s a number of bands that do this, but The Pauses feel like they’re on fresher ground:
Anywho, finding fresh sounds is hard, even that Flying Lotus recommendation sounds largely like retread 90s electronica/trip hop/and funk. It’s generally easier to find a genre or sound and delve into the acts still performing that genre well.
Whoa, that Sleigh Bells song is good. I only know them from “Rill Rill” (which I liked). Will have to give them another spin.
Their first record is a certified classic IMO. Half of the bass and guitar notes will make you question if your speakers are blown… In a good way.
I am over 50 and guarantee that if you listen to Cate Le Bon you will hear music that sounds like nothing you’ve heard before. I haven’t heard the new release yet in its entirety, but Crab Day is brilliant.
Cate Le Bon other than the Cate Le Bon posted above? Not familiar with her work, but the track on this page sounds like perfectly pleasant meandering indie pop that would be indistinguishable from any other perfectly pleasant mid-tempo indie artist.
As I said, listen to Crab Day. I’ve still not heard the new album in its entirety, but Crab Day is not just an average MOR indie release.
Very late response to say that her more guitar-oriented earlier work is better. Check out “Fold the Cloth” or “Are You With Me Now”.
New Cate Le Bon is amazing. 9/10
When are these waif-ey girls with “problems” going to go away. Or at least take a singing lesson? Oh, I know. They have ADD and peanut allergies and that’s so awful and sad but really, 20 years of this shit?
thought the header pic was carrie ann moss
Cash shit is just that, shit for the cash. It has zero soul, creativity or longevity. That beat can be made in 5 minutes with a PC, the bla bla she blabbers over it is entirely forgettable. We need to stop celebrating plastic ass throwaway shit like that. Fuck the current state of rap music.
I’ve been obsessively spinning Steve Lacy’s debut Apollo XXI. I’m convinced it’s the greatest thing to bless my ears in awhile. But outside of that, Fever is mostly playing through my speakers. Shit hits different in the car. Good year for music. We eatin’.
In my music life lately the wife and I went and saw Smino live; it was far more fun than I anticipated. One of the few artists I’ve seen where his voice is more impressive in person. The speed of his ‘rapping’ (which I feel the need to put in quotations because it’s melodic and sung) was damn impressive to see live and the sold out crowd was into it singing every word back. I wonder if this will be the year he breaks out; felt like a big name star in hip hop that night. I’ve been listening to quite a bit of Igor lately, but for the first few days of its release it basically got ignored for the new Curren$y album, which had me going back to playing Fetti again. I also liked the Pivot Gang album too as far as hip hop goes…The National has gotten a little too slow for me. The unrelenting morbid assault of their lyrics only works for me with a little pace and percussion, apparently. Couldn’t really get into the Vampire Weekend album, either…