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The Music Column
Music - Kanye West, Olafur Arnalds & Nils Frahm, Pet Shop Boys.
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My Kanye West review last issue may have been harsh, but that’s only because I was angry he didn’t release the album on Spotify. Now that it is readily available, I can confirm that it’s still overhyped trash. While West makes many statements on The Life of Pablo, he really cements the fact that he is a better producer than he is a rapper. Sample ranges are rich and varied, the combinations of different samples on “No More Parties in L.A.” are messy but work in conjunction with Kendrick Lamar’s song-saving verse on the rich Californian lifestyle. A few tracks like “Famous” have 808 drum beats that make you want to shake your a$$ and holler at the sky, but these moments are few and far between. The album contains less autotune but more half-thought out and absurd lyrics, (‘Sometimes I wish that my dick had GoPro’) and choices of using the words ‘Bitch’ and ‘Nigger’ seem more like lazy songwriting rather than unadulterated genius. Kanye is no God and The Life of Pablo is certainly no masterpiece. Trance Frendz was released earlier in the year, and to little surprise the album does not contain trance beats. Nils Frahm’s spacious piano melodies team up with Olafur Arnalds’ electronic sounds and together they’ve produced quality. The duo recorded and improvised over an entire night, selecting a few pieces from what they’d made. The duo’s skills blend perfectly together, especially on ‘23:17’, where Frahm combines his soft piano with Arnald’s emotive electronics. They continue the synth soundscapes on the next track, ‘23:52’ which gets too intense for its own good and upsets the quietness the initial tracks earlier setup. The pair spend the next 15 minutes never venturing closer to that hard crescendo, and bring the album to a close softly, the way it started. The record rises and falls, albeit a great soundtrack for a quiet night in.
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From their seemingly endless collection of discography, The Pet Shop Boys have returned with Super. They’re one of the rare bands that never seem to change as the years pass, yet their work always sounds fresh. On the album Neil Tennant sings about sad robots, dictators with their hands tied, and being groovy in London’s west end, while Chris Lowe provides the disco/electronic infused beats. The songsters move from one upbeat high to the next with ease, and the album rarely stops providing the goods. A few tracks drop the bar, ‘Twenty-Something’s’, ‘Sad Robot World’, and ‘Into Thin Air’ are the slower, more relaxed tracks that just don’t work next to tracks like ‘Inner Sanctum’, ‘Burn’, and ‘The Pop Kids’ which are begging to be played at your next dance party.
AUTHOR Aden Beaver, 19, Bachelor of Creative Arts (Digital Media) If Aden could live in any fictional universe, he would probably choose The Thunderbirds (the best show!)
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