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😄 beckah amani / sober review

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but first, the news

yes that’s right, news time! a short selection of links to all things going on in the music biz:

• ¥øu$uk€ ¥uk1mat$u tore it up at boiler room

• david lynch passed away ☹️ but we got to hear about his band

• the village people inaugurated trump or whatever

more i’ve been listening to

everything is recorded, sampha, laura groves, jah wobble, yazz ahmed / losing you

a pretty vast collab that sounds huge, grooves hard and feels important

moonchild sanelly / scrambled eggs

there’s a lotttt going on in this song, but all of it is extremely cool, so who can say if it’s good. i can, and i do, this song is coollllll

nick ward / shooting star

bit of sunshine indie for you all on a lil jan morn awk how lovely x

genre: indie
release date: 29/11/24
runtime: 3:50
video: no :(

contents

• 😄 beckah amani / sober review

• but first, the news

• more i’ve been listening to

  • nick ward / shooting star

    • what i like

    • what i don't like

    • my drunk opinion

    • for fans of

    • should you listen to more

• next edition out next tuesday!

this will beeeeeee another quick one sorry gang, i am very much still ill which is driving me crazy but also making me bad at writing but thankfully, we’ve found an absolute banger this week. i’m going to channel that energy into getting better. this weeks track is another indie number, or is it, it’s got a few r’n’b / hip hop influences going on, but it is solidly in that indie pop camp but it has lots and lots of influences, lots and lots of details, lots and lots of good stuff so let’s do it, meet beckah amani and their track sober.

i’m not going to tell you about my favourite bit just yet, there’s a bit in this that is jaw droppingly good but before we get there, let’s talk about soundscape and timbre. this is a song that plays with those things so easily and gets such results from them. elements like the arpeggiated piano and the massive gang vocals backing the main thrust of the song do such a great job of making the song feel like it’s own thing. that on top of the vocalists work toying with the melody of this song, stretching some notes, closing some off, giving some with an absolutely sung melody, some almost spoken. it’s a smorgashboard of detail and extra bits added or taken away almost at will that leave this song feeling like it’s something utterly bespoke and intentional. okay now lets’ address the elephant in the room - that middle section with the brass coming in and opening the song up? oh man, it’s beautiful. i loveeeeee how slick it feels and how well it works it’s way into the song and the delivery itself after a long day had me bopping away on the bus. i think that’s a win if ever i saw one.

i felt like this song honestly really earned another big ol bite of the cherry with that middle section. the really heartfelt and powerful back end verse and chorus is so heavy and done so well but then kind of doesn’t really do much else other than sort of riff on the main ideas. i think it could’ve really done with a final few bars bringing in the middle section even harder, rather than as a shadow of itself in a half effort.

a lot of songs go for the big and the bold and the powerful, but not all manage it, this on the other hand? with ease i tells you, with ease!

i thought a lot about self esteem here, lots of big powerful vocals, lots of important messages and lots of knowing how to kick it into high gear and deliver a punch, beautiful

it’s really weird how this artist has the no of streams that they do becuase this is the kind of artist who looks set to absolutely blow up given the right conditions. i really hope they do because they are sick!

or better yet, reply to this email! what did you think of this song? have you been listening to anything good lately? any gems i’ve missed?

next edition out next tuesday!