Issue 53

One Direction in Five Directions | 08

you better work that

Is Hip-Hop Too High? | 25

PURSE FIRST the importance of drag music

So, What Exactly Is Bedroom Pop? | 38

northeastern students on music

No 53

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The Team

Tastemakers Music Magazine 232 Curry Student Center 360 Huntington Ave. Boston, MA 02115 tastemakersmag@gmail.com Š 2018 tastemakers music magazine all rights reserved

Staff Writers Addy Pedro Akosa Amenechi Alex Trzaskowski Alexander Wetzel Allison Bako Amanda Sturm Christian Triunfo Elena Sandell Emma Turney Erin Merkel Grant Foskett Helen Snow Isaac Feldberg Joanna Moore Jonas Polin Joseph Bondi Matthew Schuler

Maya Dengel Miles Kirsch Pratik Reddy Quinton Hubbell Rachel Ellis Rayven Tate Ryan Clark Sabrina Zhang Sean Stewart Seth Queeney Stacy Andryshak Taylor Piepenbrink Vishal Makhijani Art & Design Alex Agahnia Allison Bako Anna Rychlik Anna Smith Bianca Rabbie Brooke Dunahugh Jackie Arce Kat Minor Natalie Duerr Roman Distefano Ryan Fleischer Sam Marchesi Stephanie Miano Promotions Annina Hare Ash Livid Brandon Yap Brigid Sanepour Caitlyn Ark Cara Jones Fisher Hunnewell Hannah Lowicki Jane Slaughter Joey Handel Julia Boll Katie Isbell Kiera Perryman Kylie Ponce Laura Masnato Matthew Malcolm Patrick Milne Rishabh Pudhota Spencer Haber Taylor Poehlman Tiffany Li-Ah-Kim Victoria Specht Photography Abbey Hembree

Aidan Cooke Alex Aghania Alex Melagrano Alex Pesek Alison Kula Amanda Stark Annina Hare Anushka Sagar Brandon Yap Brian Bae Brigid Sanepour Calem Robertson Carley Rowe Casey Buttke Casey Martin Catherine Argyrople Colleen Curtis Deema Binmahi Derek Schuster Elice Ongko Emily English Emily Porter Emma Ingallinera Frances Lee Gilbert Wong Jacob Chvatal Jay Brimeyer Joyce Hsieh Julia Aguam Justin Vega Kerri Ann Beck Kiera Perryman Kristen Chen Lydia Tavera Maddy Land Maggie Navracruz Natalie McGowan Nik Pousette Harger Nina Spellman Nola Chen Oriana Dominguez Peiying Li Phi Dieu Hang Nguyen Prachi Gupta Rayn Tavares Rayven Tate Saakhi Singh Sam Cronin Sean Kolczynski Tyler Blint-Welsh

Meet the Staff

About Taylor Piepenbrink Position Staff Writer Major Music Industry Graduating May 2019 Favorite Venue House of Blues Tastemaker Since Spring 2015

Aarti Amalean Position Art Director Major Interaction Design Graduating 2019 Favorite Venue Paradise Rock Club Tastemaker Since Fall 2018

Pratik Reddy Position Staff Writer Major Economics Graduating May 2021 Favorite Venue House of Blues Tastemaker Since Spring 2017

Lauren Scornavacca Position Photo Director Major Industrial Engineering Graduating 2021 Favorite Venue House of Blues Tastemaker Since Fall 2016

Listening to

Turnover Good Nature Citizen As you please Hozier Jackie and Wilson

Coldplay Magic Shallow Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper

Quote

“I’ve somehow managed to avoid Meet the Staff my entire time with Tastemakers lol.”

“A senior but always a freshman at heart.”

RJD2 Ghostwriter

Lil Uzi Vert Luv is Rage Smino Blkswn Young Thug On the Rvn

Lauv Superhero Ben Rector Magic James Bay Electric Light

“You don’t need to write an album review if the artist never ends up dropping his album.”

“I’M SO READY.”

Photo

James Bay, Royale

Photo by Lauren Scornavacca (Industrial Engineering)

Table of Contents Cover Story

Editorials

Interviews

28

08

32

You Better Work That Purse First: The Importance of Drag Music While trashy on the surface, drag music and its key players reveal a culture of beautiful sisterhood and camaraderie in an art form that is more mainstream than ever.

Features

10

We Out Here: The South London Jazz Scene and Its Moment Buried under a miasma of influences and visionaries, the South London Jazz Scene is having a moment right now, one that we are here to dig into.

25

Come Back to Earth: Is Hip-Hop Too High?

Drug abuse in the hip-hop community is not as black and white an issue as you would think. Take a deep dive into some of the nuances of rap’s substance phenomenon.

35

Black Eyeliner and Bad Haircuts, Where Have the Emo Kids Gone?

We know that you still bump all of these bands in the shower on the daily, so ever wondered where they are now?

06

Calendar

18

Local Photos

One Direction in Five Directions You may not realize it, but every One Direction album was the beta for a different member’s future solo career, and we are here to give the full breakdown.

16

Is Eminem Actually Washed Up? The last two years have shone an uncomfortable spotlight on Marshall, and lately we’ve been forced to ask, “Is Eminem truly washed up?”

38

So, What Exactly Is Bedroom Pop? One of music’s fastest-growing subgenres, bedroom pop shows how tricky it is to maintain your artistic style with a newfound studio budget.

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40

31 43

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FIDLAR, Django Django, Troye Sivan, The Game of Thrones Experience

Album Reviews BROCKHAMPTON, Eminem, Mitski, Aphex Twin

Queen of Jeans Our chat with the Philadelphia quartet that absolutely rocked (and charmed the hell out of ) our recent Present show.

In Defense Of Kesha’s Animal

My Favorite Song: “30” by Danny Brown Everyone holds a particular song dear to them, and this issue our editor Tim DiFazio explains just what about “30” makes it so special to him.

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Reviews Show Reviews

We sat down with Jess Abbott and company before she took the stage to close our semiannual concert.

Etcetera

Growing Pains: The Evolution of Music Festivals From Gov Ball to Coachella, American music festivals feel more cookie cutter than ever these days, and the formula needs shaking up.

Tancred

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Death Grips Is in Print Take a ride with us down the rabbit hole of the discography of one of experimental hip-hop’s top acts.

Just a Taste of trash girl—A glimpse into the music style and life of the local Boston act.

Calendar November Su

Mo

Tu

We

Th

Fr

1

4

5

6

Maggie Rogers Royale

Maggie Rogers Royale

11

12

13

Danity Kane Wilbur Theater

St. Lucia Royale

18

19

20

(Sandy) Alex G Paradise Rock Club

Poppy House of Blues

Echo and The Bunnymen Orpheum Theater

25

26

27

28

The Paper Kites Paradise Rock Club

Coeur De Pirate Paradise Rock Club

Rockommends

7

2

3

Billie Eilish House of Blues

Yaeji Paradise Rock Club

8

9

10

Julien Baker &

Kiiara Sinclair

Kiiara Sinclair

16

17

Phoebe Bridgers House of Blues

14

Sa

15

Jim James Shubert Theater

21

22

29

23

24

Allen Stone Royale

Thom York Wang Theater

30

1 Snail Mail The Sinclair

Yaeji November 3 @ Paradise Rock Club

Thom Yorke November 24 @ Wang Theater

Catching the interest of underground house and hip-hop fans alike, Korean-American artist Yaeji makes her first stopover at Boston’s Paradise Rock Club this November. After completing a significant stint of festival appearances and international touring, Yaeji’s infectious yet soothing dance tracks are sure to keep you invested.”

It’s Thom Yorke, you know what to expect: 2 hours of a man baring his soul on stage through an ocean of ambient guitars, piano, and calming soundscapes.

Expect a mixture of classics and new tracks alike from this solo tour by the Radiohead frontman, and go spend an evening just mellowing out.

Vishal Makhijani (Politics, Philosophy and Economics)

Jason Levy (Marketing)

December

You can view the calendar online at: http://tastemakersmag.com/calendar

Su

Mo

2

3

Travis Scott TD Garden

9

10

Tu

We

Th

Fr

Sa

4

5

6

7

8

Wild Child Royale

The Internet Paradise Rock Club

11

12

Anime House of Blues

16

18

19

Jorja Smith House of Blues

30

13

Chris Lane Paradise Rock Club

17

23

Lindsay Buckingham Capitol Center for the Arts

20

14

15

Ghost Wang Theater

Ingrid Michaelson Orpheum Theaster

21

22

28

29

Hop Along Paradise Rock Club

Hop Along Paradise Rock Club

NGHTMRE House of Blues

24

25

26

27

31 Lake Street Dive Wang Theater

Snail Mail December 1 @ The Sinclair

The Internet December 5 @ Paradise Rock Club

Snail Mail is this year’s newest indie rock sensation, and for good reason. Her debut album Lush masterfully maneuvers the intricacies of the summer crush with songwriting skills well beyond her age. So if you’re looking to brighten your winter with a bit of summertime sadness, Snail Mail at The Sinclair is the perfect show for you.

The Internet, a band headed by Syd the Kid, is back in Boston to perform their new album Hive Mind. Their fourth album is full of jams, and if you’re a fan of R&B music and groovy beats you’ll love to see them live.

Grant Foskett (Computer Science)

Rayven Tate (Mechanical Engineering)

Editorial

ONE ONE DIRECTION DIRECTION IN IN FIVE FIVE DIRECTIONS DIRECTIONS

I will be the first to admit that I was a closet Directioner for most of my life. As a middle schooler, my indie street cred could not be risked at any cost, even for five British men singing me love songs.

But as an adult woman, I will fully admit that for the past week, I’ve been listening exclusively to the group’s solo and collaborative work.

Yes, we all remember that fateful day when Zayn Malik left the group, triggering the end of the boyband we once held so dearly. However, the disbandment of One Direction allowed the members to explore their unique sounds, which were often masked by the overall image of the upbeat pop band as a collective. As solo artists today, many of each member’s sonic influences can also be related back to their input on previous albums as One Direction:

ALBUM: ALBUM: UP UP ALL ALL NIGHT NIGHT (2011) (2011)

REPRESENTATIVE REPRESENTATIVE MEMBER: MEMBER: LOUIS LOUIS TOMLINSON TOMLINSON Up All Night is the iconic debut album released by One Direction that launched them into stardom and became the third best-selling studio album of 2012. Up All Night is a typical boyband entrance LP consumed with catchy tunes that dabble in sub pop genres such as dance-pop, teen-pop, and power-pop. Much of the lyrical content on Up All Night reflects their youth and focuses itself around heartbreak and empowerment with songs like “What Makes You Beautiful” and “I Want.”

With collaborations featuring Bebe Rexha and Steve Aoki, Louis Tomlinson’s solo career closely aligns itself to the first 1D album.

Although Tomlinson hasn’t released much since the disbandment of the group, Tomlinson’s few singles stay true to the dance-pop beats seen on tracks such as “Everything About You” and “Save You Tonight.”

Tomlinson’s track “Miss You” could easily have been recorded under One Direction (sans the explicit lyrics).

ALBUM: ALBUM: TAKE TAKE ME ME HOME HOME (2012) (2012)

REPRESENTATIVE REPRESENTATIVE MEMBER: MEMBER: ZAYN ZAYN MALIK MALIK Take Me Home is the boyband’s second studio album, which mimics similar tones of falling in love from their debut release, however one notable difference is the addition of percussive instrumentation and peppy 80s synths.

Zayn Malik was the first member of One Direction to depart from the group, releasing Mind of Mine in 2016 under ZAYN. Unlike much of the music made under One Direction, ZAYN’s solo efforts lean towards hip-hop and R&B, with collaborations from Kehlani, Timberland, and PARTYNEXTDOOR. However, old One Direction roots die hard with ballads such as “fOoL fOr YoU,” exposing ZAYN’s vocals with only piano and drums to accompany him, similar to that of “Little Things” off Take Me Home. Although the overall storyline of ZAYN’s solo LP was criticized for lacking a clear narrative, the overall tone of Mind of Mind follows that of Take Me Home as the tracks float through themes of desire, love, and lust.

Fall 2018

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ALBUM: ALBUM: MADE MADE IN IN THE THE A.M. A.M. (2015) (2015) REPRESENTATIVE REPRESENTATIVE MEMBER: MEMBER: LIAM LIAM PAYNE PAYNE

REPRESENTATIVE REPRESENTATIVE MEMBER: MEMBER: HARRY HARRY STYLES STYLES

Midnight Memories pushed the group towards a more rock ’n ’roll sound filled with heavy electric guitar and energetic “OW” screams in the background of tracks, while still stuck to their trademark boyband harmony roots . Most notably, “Best Song Ever” came under fire for its similarities in the opening guitar riff to The Who’s “Baba O’Riley” (producer Julian Bunetta stated that he thought One Direction had been inspired by The Who and denied copyright violations).

Following the 70s rock ’n’ roll feel Midnight Memories projected, Harry Styles’ self-titled debut album adapted heavy electric guitar riffs from his boyband days on tracks like “Kiwi” and “Woman.”

Arguably, Styles has overall had the most successful solo career thus far, with praise for his first solo release coming from Liam Gallagher and Gene Simmons, who thanked Styles for “bringing back rock.” While other rockers and critics did not share such prominent enthusiasm for his debut, the LP clearly showed a departure from Harry’s One Direction days.

Designer: Stephanie Miano (Interaction Design)

ALBUM: ALBUM: MIDNIGHT MIDNIGHT MEMORIES MEMORIES (2013) (2013)

The final release, and first without Zayn Malik was Made In The A.M. After releasing their first single, “Drag Me Down,” and announcing the title for their fifth album, Made In The A.M, the group had gone from committing to a temporary hiatus to officially taking a break.

Longtime producer, Julian Bunetta stated that many of the songs on the album were inspired by the fact that the group knew this would be their last time recording together for a while. Made In The A.M. contains narratives of anxiety towards their future on tracks like “End of the Day,” love (“Olivia”), and the pain of loss (“Drag Me Down”) while still being upbeat.

Similarly to Tomlinson’s departure from the group, Liam Payne has only released a few tracks, making it a bit hard to judge his solo career. However, “Depend on It,” one of the ballads off of Payne’s EP, First Time, relay similar tones of the pain of betrayal and fear of the future as seen on Made In The A.M. and previous One Direction efforts.

Payne’s most notable work however, comes from his collaboration with reggaetón star J Balvin on the single “Familiar,” which combines his dance-pop style with Balvin’s Latin flare. The combination of a simple, yet catchy hook (àla One Direction’s “Drag Me Down”) with a heavily percussive backbeat showcases Payne’s vocals and a development of his solo-career in a dance-centered genre.

From collaborations with the hottest stars in hip-hop to reggaetón, it’s clear the boys are searching for their own unique sounds to defy their music interests beyond that of their boyband days. While still in the process of this adjustment, if One Direction’s solo careers have shown us anything, it’s that although they’ve each gone in their separate directions, their past together can be seen as early influence on their evolving individual sounds. And maybe if we’re lucky enough, we’ll get the reunion tour we deserve.

• Maya Dengel (Communication/Media and Screen Studies)

ALBUM: ALBUM: FOUR FOUR (2014) (2014)

REPRESENTATIVE REPRESENTATIVE MEMBER: MEMBER: NIALL NIALL HORAN HORAN One Direction’s fourth studio album, titled Four was the last collective effort released with all 5 members before Zayn Malik departed from the group in early 2015. The album offered writing collaborations with Ed Sheeran on the track “18,” and gave primary writing credits to Louis Tomlinson and Liam Payne on the majority of tracks.

Although the songwriting team of Payne and Tomlinson played largely into the construction of the album’s sound, the overall tone is reminiscent of Niall Horan’s Flicker, released at the end of 2017.

Horan’s Eagles-inspired LP largely contains folky acoustic guitar while melding his boyband past on songs such as “You and Me,” in similar contrast to “Fools Golds” on One Direction’s Four.

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Feature

We out Here

The South The South London Jazz Scene and Its Moment London Jazz Scene and Its Moment

Fall 2018

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So much of the appeal and longevity of jazz has been due to its democratic and accessible nature. Throughout its mid-20th century heyday, the genre had an energy that was ubiquitous in the way that hip-hop has become in the last three decades. Different cities would adopt it in ways that reflected their own musical heritage, and it often towed the line between being a movement that was intellectual and accessible. It was rooted not only in an admiration for innovative musicianship but also in the blues. In developing their style and skill, jazz musicians often reached for sounds and melodies that they knew would resonate with their listeners at a given time and place.

The current decade in South London has been that time and place for many artists and listeners alike. It has been home to a burgeoning jazz scene that is pushing almost every conceivable boundary within the genre, and is doing so in a way that is both fluid with the city’s culture and angled toward the sensibilities of younger listeners. The scene shows its eminence through not only the popularity of traditional jazz venues, but also on dancefloors and in night clubs, where it is not uncommon for jazz bands to play fusion tinged with grime or Afrobeat, or for DJs to incorporate bebop tunes into their live sets. The streaming habits of local listeners have also seemingly changed: over the summer, Spotify reported that among UK subscribers, streams of the Spotify UK Jazz playlist have increased by 108% in 2018 alone. Additionally, the UK’s prestigious MOBO Awards introduced a Best Jazz Act category in 2013, which has since honored the work of younger luminaries in the scene, most notably drummer Moses Boyd, who has won the award twice.

The scene’s roots can be traced back to BBC DJ and producer Gilles Peterson, who in the late 1980s curated a party in South London that brought together up-and-coming jazz musicians, perennially popular London DJs, and other DJs who were bringing the American sounds of hip-hop and house to the UK. The initial result was a genre called “acid jazz,” which involved traditional jazz soloing instruments over house and hip-hop beats. Maturing alongside grime, garage, and broken beat, acid jazz enjoyed club popularity and commonly featured London musicians of Afro-Caribbean descent. The presence of jazz, even in this niche form, in such a musically diverse city made young London musicians, especially black ones, excited about the art form and eager to figure out how best to participate in it. In an interview with BBC earlier this year, Moses Boyd explained: “I grew up listening to a lot of grime and reggae and hip-hop and Afrobeat, and then when I got into jazz it was like, ‘How can I mix these soundworlds?’ So it was trying to put all of those worlds together.”

Boyd and his contemporaries have spent the last several years combining those worlds while varying widely in style, sensibility, and attitude. In February of this year, the South London-based indie label Brownswood Recordings, managed by Peterson, released the jazz compilation We Out Here, along with a documentary of the same name, as a showcase of the scene and culture which surrounds it.

The sounds on the compilation serve as a cross-section of the city’s music, and the different sounds which produced it. “Pure Shade” by Ezra Collective is an Afrobeat jam that recalls any one of Fela Kuti’s classic tracks. “Once” by Nubya Garcia is a composition in the vein

of more traditional piano trios like GoGo Penguin or The Bad Plus.

Moses Boyd’s “The Balance” takes the listener through a soundscape of house sounds and late aughts indie rock guitars, with mechanistic drumming that hardly swings. The closer, Kokoroko’s warm “Abusey Junction,” creates a space where each voice takes their solo over a slow rocking, Bossa-tinged beat.

The We Out Here documentary packs a lot of this sensibility in a half hour, telling the story of a group of young musicians and labelmates who have, in fact, been performing together for years. As members of the youth music group Tomorrow’s Warriors, a program spearheaded by jazz bassist Gary Crosby, many of the scene’s most well-known musicians have been playing in groups together since they were teenagers. Through this experience, these musicians not only became confident as individual performers, but developed a collective sense of identity as a group. In the documentary, Crosby reflected on how Tomorrow’s Warriors is part of a growing movement in London to provide jazz education to younger people, but sees that the energy making this happen is coming from the young musicians themselves.

He noted: “This particular generation, they realize that you [can do more than just] run things – you own it,” referring to the genre’s culture, direction, and goals.

In the documentary, it’s apparent that the culture encompasses fashion and performative dance, different styles of musical performance, and a way of learning the genre’s past, even as it develops past its roots. Often coming from different worldly

backgrounds, many of these musicians can visualize where their expressiveness, background, and energy fits into the culture, making it dynamic but also accessible to those who aren’t well-versed in jazz performance, or to even those who are not necessarily musicians.

Because of this creative outlook, a style which is often associated with tradition has become one that people love to dance to.

While not home to any jazz scene that comes close in impact and reach as South London’s, the United States’ interest in jazz is rekindling, and many of the biggest jazz musicians still look

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Feature there for inspiration. The 2016 album Black Focus, released by London keyboardist Kamaal Williams and drummer Yussef Dayes (as Yussef Kaamal) to wide acclaim, features a slick, funky sound that would not have sounded out of place during the early 70s peak of American jazz fusion. Its meanderings and complex song structures over tight grooves recall Miles Davis’s 1972 LP On The Corner, but the record adds a unique intermingling of hip-hop and broken beat. Williams’s subsequent album The Return, released earlier this year, develops that homage with more of a focus on electronic experimentation.

Within the United States, the popularity of neo-soul and jazz-rap over the last few decades has introduced many hip-hop and R&B fans to jazz as a sort of musical ancestor, but haven’t fully reincorporated it into popular music. Aside from larger cities, many Americans see jazz as something inaccessible and distant, and a medium which is more traditional than it is dynamic. However, these waves of popularity have over time coincided with a trend of increasing live instrumentation in hop-hop, and releases which blur the lines between hip-hop, jazz, and funk. Jazz pianist Robert Glasper’s 2012 magnum opus Black Radio was one of the first contemporary records to wholeheartedly accomplish this, uniting jazz trio improvisation with vocal jazz, funk, and hip-hop. A few years later, Flying Lotus fused these genres together in his own way with

Designer: Alex Agahnia (Marketing and Design)

Fall 2018

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You’re Dead!, and shortly thereafter, Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly famously launched the careers of Thundercat and Kamasi Washington into the mainstream.

This interest also shows itself in the changing sensibility of established artists toward a more organic sound. Tyler, The Creator recently released the jazz rap album Flower Boy, and while the LP was firmly rooted in hip-hop sounds, the ongoing tour that followed features Tyler performing with a live funk band. Instances of established musicians taking this direction show that the collaborative energy to make jazz exists in many places, because they often tap into pre-existing jazz and funk scenes to find their bands. However, if we ever see jazz scenes emerge in as dynamic and far-reaching a way that the scene in South London has, it will have to be in a place where jazz culture can intersect different sounds and present itself in an accessible way. Jazz has always been an innovative and provocative art form, and the fuel it needs to be all of those things is in the people who love the music and are excited to push it forward.

• Alex Trzaskowski

(Civil Engineering)

Show Reviews FIDLAR

Paradise Rock Club 9.14.18

It’s been over three years since LA-based punk rock band FIDLAR has released an album, and almost two years since they’ve been in Boston. When they took to the stage at Paradise Rock Club, the pent-up energy was impossible to ignore. With each band member stocked up with two water bottles and two cans of Modelo, the fervent audience was about to get everything they had been waiting for.

If they hadn’t been holding guitars on a stage, one may have confused FIDLAR for a puzzling crew featuring a distraught painter (bassist Brandon Schwartzel), a hospital patient (lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist Zac Carper), an Applebees manager (lead guitarist and vocalist Elvis Kuehn), and, well, a punk drummer (drummer Max Kuehn).

A quick “woohoo” from bassist Brandon Schwartzel was the only warning before FIDLAR dove right into their recent single “Alcohol,” immediately bringing blaring vocals and heavy bass lines. Lead vocalist Carper has never been shy about his love for and dependence on drugs and alcohol, and its influence on FIDLAR’s past discography is quite explicit — it’s clear not much has changed.

The crowd reached a new level of energy when the familiar, beachy guitar riffs of “No Waves” rang out. During the fast-paced FIDLAR classic, the band put

their surfy origins on full display, a beautiful contrast to their harsher side. Carper’s more pleasant, softer singing was teased again during “40oz. On Repeat,” serving as both a brief reprieve from the strenuous screaming and as a reminder of Carper’s vocal versatility.

In case their political and societal opinions were too implicit, the band made sure to cover their bases with a performance of their single “Too Real,” released the day of the show. The cynical song is pointed at what Carper sees as an oversensitive generation, dismissing the ideas of political correctness and white guilt, singing “You’ve gone so far to the left, you ended up on the right / You’ve gone so far to the right, you don’t care if you’re right / Are you really feeling guilty about being white?” Shortly after, Carper declared a “girls only moshpit” during the frantic “5 to 9,” for all those skeptics in doubt of their progressiveness. With the current political climate as polarized as it is, Carper is accusing both sides of being stuck in their ideologies, too defensive to even listen to the other side. In which case, Carper and the rest of FIDLAR don’t want to listen to you.

FIDLAR indulged fans with a couple of new songs, both of which carried a more polished, mainstream sound, while of

course featuring some serious shredding.

Carper also reminded the audience that they’d be releasing an album in the coming weeks, ending the three year drought. After a few more cuts from their sophomore album, Too, FIDLAR rounded things out with three songs from their debut 2012 album.

“Wake Bake Skate,” a quintessential punk motto, put an exclamation point on the performance with an epic final jam.

The steady flow of crowd surfers being reeled in by security ended, as did the furious yelling, vicious head-banging, and blissful smiles. All of the members of FIDLAR had finished their beers without even touching their waters, and it appeared as if their fans had followed suit. With a taste of new music and an overwhelming wave of nostalgia, everyone went home — at least temporarily — happy.

band’s quirky, feel-good sound. Shortly after their self-titled debut album, Django Django embarked on a US tour and came to the very same Paradise Rock Club over five years ago.

With two additional albums under their belt and an EP released the day after their show, it was time for their grand return.

First up, however, were The Shacks, a band formed in Queens, New York just a few years back. Nearly half the age of the

members of Django Django, Shannon Wise (lead vocalist and bassist) put such youth on full display, energizing the smattering of people in the audience with her angelic, gentle vocals and a smile that didn’t leave her face for the entire performance. Lead guitarist Max Shrager brought along some warbling, whammy-infused riffs that perfectly matched Wise’s atmospheric voice. Refreshing in their simplicity (save

Miles Kirsch (Bioengineering)

Django Django

Paradise Rock Club 10.11.18

Django Django makes good music.

Django Django put on a good live show.

Unfortunately, these statements are sufficient in recapping their recent performance at Paradise Rock Club.

Formed in 2009 in London, the British band is hard to categorize into a single genre. A dash of disco, a healthy dose of pop, and a whole lot of psychedelic rock are all part of the larger recipe that forms the

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Reviews

for a five-plus minute jam that sounded like a Charlie Brown / Bohemian Rhapsody mashup) and charm, The Shacks threatened to steal the show.

Django Django frontman Vincent Neff was determined to prevent this, as he animatedly navigated the stage and made his presence felt from the opening track.

The vocals, while impressive, initially came out muffled and echo-y, partially drowning in the frantic keys and baselines of “Marble Skies.” Thus, while Neff remained in the spotlight, synthesizer operator Tommy Grace was dominating the sound. Grace, who looked like your middle school science teacher on a casual Friday, had the most extensive keys and synths set up I’ve ever seen, and put it to good use. The ‘70s and ‘80s nostalgia-inducing synthesizers and keys

were particularly impactful during some of the more trippy and funky parts of the show.

While most of the show was comprised of decent performances of the studio versions of their tracks, Django Django did show off some of their creativity. At one point, bassist Jimmy Dixon joined David Maclean on the drums while Neff and Grace hammered on their own drum sets, making for an epic, rumbling jam session. Throughout the show, Grace further fleshed out his aesthetic with some tambourine playing, Neff added to the percussions with a wooden agogo, and Dixon nailed some difficult whistling harmonies worthy of applause.

A new track, “Spirals,” with a repetitive refrain “higher and higher” that felt longer and longer, and an intense, invigorating

performance of “WOR” closed out the band’s set. With the crowd slowly filing out, a small group of teenage girls jumping up and down and a middle-aged man proving his ability to do so as well made up most of the remaining excitement. Django Django has an enjoyable, unique sound, and their vocals and instrumentations were solid throughout the night, however the inconsistency in creative energy didn’t leave me a member of the jumping crowd.

lone microphone stand. He began singing the opening song to Bloom, ‘Seventeen,’ and paused to disappear behind stage once again and appear with the rest of the band in a dramatic curtain drop. Sivan then went right into the enigmatic ‘Bloom,’ jumping around stage in a full red suit. The transitions in between songs kept the theatrical nature of the show going with his band swinging right from track to track.

Sivan stopped to give a short speech about his own coming out experience before going into his LGBTQ anthem, “Heaven.” As the song began the crowd lifted up colored paper flowers behind their phone lights and made the theater a giant pride flag. It was revealed that the flowers had actually been placed around the theater by a group of fans and Sivan brought them on stage to take a picture.

Sivan took the time to show off the talent of his band, as keyboardist Kaela Sinclair absolutely killed the female features on Bloom and Blue Neighborhood. Halfway through the show after a quick costume change, Sivan and Sinclair gave an emotional duet of ‘Postcard’ while sitting on a couch surrounded by lamps elevated on the stage.

The hidden gem in the evening came when Sinclair perfectly executed Alessia Cara’s feature on ‘Wild.’

The encore included fan favorites, ‘Youth’ and ‘My, My, My,’ with the latter ending in a club remix. The night felt like a celebration of pop music with Sivan lifting the energy of the room, one cringe-inducing dance move at a time. This show was one of the most fluidly connected concert experiences I’ve ever been a part of and set Troye Sivan as possibly the next great performer of our generation.

Miles Kirsch (Bioengineering)

Troye Sivan

Wang Theatre 10.12.18

Fall 2018

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Troye Sivan radiates star power with a show that was built for stadiums. Don’t sleep on Sivan as the Bloom Tour sets him up to be the next big thing in pop music.

Sivan’s songwriting partner turned solo act, Leland, started the show at a lower energy, not coming into his own until the final track of his set, “Mattress.” Things really got started when pop princess Kim Petras took the stage. Her ability to command the crowd was unlike usual opening acts and halfway through her set I was convinced this was a Kim Petras concert with Troye Sivan closing. Petras is reminiscent of Paris Hilton if her music career ever seriously took off. Though her vocals were nothing short of perfect, even late in her set, I found myself distracted by Petras’ odd DJ/hype man that was obnoxiously dancing behind her. Nevertheless, I wouldn’t be surprised if Petras made her way back to Boston soon for her own headlining tour.

It was clear from the start of Troye’s set that this show would be filled with dramatic antics. A Troye-sized-hole appeared in the red curtain and the gawky, spaghetti hair 23-year-old walked onto a foggy stage to a

Emma Turney (Communication)

The Game of Thrones Experience DCU Center 9.29.18

The Game of Thrones Live Concert Experience was exactly what it says it would be: an experience. It was immersive and unlike any show I’ve been to before. I went in thinking it would mirror a typical orchestral concert with the addition of some clips from the show playing in the background, however the moment the show started I knew I was wrong.

The energy was high in the DCU Center as fans sat in their seats awaiting the wellknown overture. After a play-through of the “Main Title,” the genius behind the music of everyone’s favorite television series, Ramin Djawadi, briefly introduced himself and then it was back to business. On the screen behind Djawadi, the house flags popped up and we were given a reel of our favorite (and least favorite) characters as he commanded the orchestra, playing a medley of house themes.

The crowd reacted with boos and cheers as

we get to see clips of the Starks, Targaryens, and the likes of Joffery and the Hound.

After the introduction of the characters and their Houses, our attention was drawn to the area in front of the stage where a spotlight shined down on a solo violinist. The orchestra began to play “Goodbye Brother” from the season one soundtrack as the violinist ascended to the ceiling with her dress cascading below her. Images danced across the fabric as she played the violin from the air, and just as you thought the scene couldn’t get any more magical, flower petals began to drift down from the sky. This is only a single instance of the amazing feats that happened during the show.

As if Djawadi couldn’t up the ante, during a portion of the show that payed tribute to the Mother of Dragons herself, Djawadi casually switched positions with another composer and started playing the

electric guitar. While our attention was focused on Djawadi’s showmanship, the orchestra reached a crescendo and flames started shooting out from every which way of the stage upon Daenerys’s command.

Combining a beautiful technical performance with otherworldly visual elements allowed me step right into the fantasy world of Game of Thrones. While flashy and bombastic, the show didn’t struggle to balance the visual aspects with the music, offering true immersion into Djawadi’s vision.

Rayven Tate (Mechanical Engineering)

Designer: Anna Smith (Graphic Design and English)

We publish show reviews online too! tastemakersmag.com

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Editorial

is

actually Designer: Sam Marchesi (Graphic & Information Design)

Fall 2018

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EMIN E M

WASHED UP? Let me paint a familiar picture: I wake up and groggily roll over to check my phone. Still bleary eyed, I vacantly scroll through Instagram and leave a few Snapchats on read. But this time something different happens. The top notification reads “Eminem drops surprise tape Kamikaze.�

I am normally hyped for all album releases, let alone one from a legend like Eminem, but really nothing felt different. Even more dismissive was the general reaction from both social media and the bulk of critical reviews. The majority seemed to make fun of his shots at the younger generation of rappers, which is new given how much respect his disses have earned historically.

Influence in music, especially hip-hop, tends to favor the young and novel over the old and incumbent. I cannot ignore that. However, this case differs for a few reasons. First of all, this is Eminem we are talking about, a bona fide superstar. He is by far the most commercially successful musician of the 2000s and even the feebly received Kamikaze hit #1 on Billboard. He is still a cash cow and that likely won’t change in the near future.

Let’s also make something else clear: if pure rapping was an Olympic sport with defined criteria and scoring, Eminem would be Michael Phelps. From a technical perspective, Em’s rhyme skills and complexity have not been tarnished by age. His form is still top notch. So what if these pesky kids aren’t showing any respect, shouldn’t the “more thoughtful” critical consensus confirm his elite status?

From From aa technical technical perspective, perspective, Em’s Em’s rhyme rhyme skills skills and and complexity complexity have have not not been been tarnished tarnished by by age. age.

The plain and simple answer is no. NPR slams Eminem’s new work as a “parody of himself” while dedicated critique sites like Metacritic (62%) and Pitchfork (5/10) contribute to the beating. It’s important to note that this weak reception follows the brutal panning that his dismal last tape, Revival, faced.

Despite this, I can’t feel bad for Em. Although I won’t dive much into my personal thoughts on Kamikaze, it is difficult to ignore how curmudgeonly he sounds. He spends a notable portion of Kamikaze’s runtime complaining, calling out new wave rappers like Lil Yachty and Pump. Aside from sounding beyond salty, Eminem’s complaints actually provoke an interesting comparison between himself and mainstream “mumble rap.” So this must mean that the legend has finally reached the “washed” stage of his career, right?

Let’s take a cornerstone of modern trap for example: Playboi Carti. Although they occupy the same genre of music as Em, their sounds could not be any different. It’s not a hot take to say that Carti is nowhere near as technically skilled as Eminem, who still has some of the best rhyme schemes, enunciation, and adhesion to beat. In fact if you look at their abilities to freestyle and create in the moment, Playboi looks like a scrub compared to Eminem. However, his album Die Lit was almost universally critically acclaimed, earning an 8.5 on Pitchfork, and enjoyed a full summer of cultural/commercial popularity.

Now you can draw his popularity to novelty and trends, but consensus approval from a community of career critics is a much tougher win. So what specifically changed in the modern music-scape that has given so much more cultural capital to Carti?

“

The argument that “no one appreciates good lyrics anymore” is plain lazy and oversimplifies a formative era in music. To be fair, there are more than a handful of rappers with uninspired/ repetitive lyrics (“Live Sheck Wes, B***H I’m dying Sheck Wes” 8x - Sheck Wes). And yes, it is tougher than it’s ever been to make it with only a specialization in lyrics. However, neither means that modern rap/trap music still doesn’t offer some of the strongest rhymers of any era. While lyricism will and should remain a key element, rappers are now demanded to place an emphasis on a more “holistic” product. This type of change is not unheard of, and is actually pretty standard in the natural progression of an artform. What the new wave instead embraces are memorable flows, a tighter connection between voice and melody, and a unique aesthetic identity.

Playboi Carti pretty naturally flourishes in all these categories and, consequently, covers these bases exceedingly well on Die Lit. He employs earworm flows and pacing with his bubbly ad-libs peppered in, reinforcing the tone.

The bouncy, spacy Pierre Bourne instrumentals pair perfectly with Carti who loves to deck his voice with synths and octave changes. Die Lit just kills it in all the intangibles of a musical work, creating a unique feeling that the genre hasn’t offered before. Now let me clarify. I am not just being disrespectful. I am not arguing that Em is or ever was worse than Playboi Carti.

I point him out because it shows just how much the genre’s landscape has shifted and how much of it Eminem has (intentionally) ignored.

what the new wave instead embraces are memorable flows, a tighter connection between voice and melody, and a unique aesthetic identity.

”

So the answer is tricky: Eminem is not washed in the conventional sense. He is still a terrific rapper and a bestseller. However, the growth of any genre is natural and expected,and rap is no exception. So I think it’s safe to say that hip-hop has now outgrown what Eminem has to offer, and has in short, left him behind.

• Pratik Reddy (Math and Economics)

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Local Photos

The Kooks, House of Blues

Photo by Lauren Scornavacca (Industrial Engineering)

Alina Baraz, Royale

Photo by Rayven Tate (Mechanical Engineering)

Bad Bad Hats, Sinclair

Photo by Catherine Argyrople (Business Administration)

Rejjie Snow, Sonia

Photo by Rayn Tavares (Mechanical Engineering)

Lucy Dacus, Sinclair

Photo by Colleen Curtis (Design)

Local Photos

Franz Ferdinand, House of Blues

Photo by Brian Bae (Industrial Engineering)

Album Reviews BROCKHAMPTON iridescence Release Date September 21 Label Question Everything/RCA Records Genre Hip-Hop/Rap

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BROCKHAMPTON spent 2017 experimenting with every aspect of releasing and recording music. While sharing a house in L.A., they released three full-length projects in less than a year along with an intricate series of music videos with its own narrative. In an interview with MTV last year, frontman Kevin Abstract described their creative process as one where each artist was encouraged to unapologetically be as creative as possible, which is apparent when one listens to the entire SATURATION trilogy. While SATURATION ranges widely in aesthetic, from late-aughts pop hooks, horrorcore, synth-led songs in the vein of Frank Ocean’s Blonde, to glossy Southern hip-hop production, SATURATION III showed the band able to synthesize all of these sounds in a way that was catchy, exciting, and thoughtful.

Released late last month, iridescence is the follow up to these projects, and their major label debut. It is their most cohesivesounding and intricately-produced album yet, but the album finds the band moving outside their comfort zone both lyrically and musically. The album is glitchier and noisier than their last, in a way reminiscent of the chaos of SATURATION but more deliberate and sophisticated, with a flowing song sequence and a greater dynamic range. The instrumentation used on this album is richer than on previous efforts, and many of its samples are spoken clips drawn from films and interviews, serving as emotional cues as well as musical devices.

Consistent with the album’s title, the project focuses on the band being put under the spotlight and observing themselves at their most confident and most insecure, their most accomplished and ambitious, their busiest and their loneliest. It catches them dealing with unmet expectations, shattered ideals, and uncertainty about the future. In “DISTRICT,” vocalist Joba raps “Praise God, Halleluiah! I’m still depressed / At war with my conscience – Paranoid, I can’t find that sh*t”. The trials of sudden fame haunt this record, with many members struggling with distance from their earlier lives as well as cynicism toward the industry that they are now a part of. Reflecting this paranoia, the

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track “LOOPHOLE” sets to music an excerpt of an interview of New York rapper Cam’ron, who reminisces about being taken advantage of by people who initially helped him succeed.

On “WEIGHT,” Abstract evokes the nostalgia that this stress causes him, rapping “I really miss the old days before the co-signs / I really miss them cold days before the road signs.”

During the SATURATION series, Merlyn, Joba, and Matt Champion, who were at that point still developing their technical skill as rappers, were compelling because their personality and lyricism allowed them to circumvent this weakness. They had the ability to turn any line into a hook and effortlessly alter the mood of a song. On this project, producers Romil Hemnani and Jabari Manwa, among others, seemed to have caught up with the shapeshifting abilities of the vocalists, and employ beat switches and tempo changes liberally, making iridescence more reflective of the group’s inner chemistry.

Unlike their previous projects, iridescence features fewer obvious bangers or ballads and weaves different moods into the same songs, contributing to an

overall stronger narrative. But this change also brings to light the album’s greatest shortcomings: When that chemistry is off, it’s noticeable. At times, the album’s tendency to constantly shift focus leads to moods that don’t last long enough, and others that are too exaggerated or too drawn out. Overall, it’s reflective of a group that is still figuring itself out, but one that isn’t afraid to innovate and make themselves vulnerable, even in a position of success.

Alex Trzaskowski (Civil Engineering)

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Eminem Kamikaze Release Date August 31 Label Aftermath Entertainment, Interscope Records, Shady Records Genre Hip-Hop/Rap Tasty Tracks “The Ringer,” “Lucky You,” “Stepping Stone”

Jason Levy (Marketing)

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Mitski Be the Cowboy Release Date August 17 Label Dead Oceans Genre Alternative/Indie Tasty Tracks “Why Didn’t You Stop Me?,” “Nobody,” “Two Slow Dancers” Mitski Miyawaki, the Japanese-American songwriter whose homes have included different continents and friends’ couches, has been tweaking her own brand of laughand-cry indie rock for over six years. If her 2014 studio release Bury Me at Makeout Creek and 2016’s Puberty 2 demonstrate Mitski’s evolution from youthful grunge to bleak realism, Be the Cowboy is impressively her most experienced and confident work, seamlessly communicating the complications of loneliness and loathing as analogous to cowboys and washing machines. In her latest work, Mitski astoundingly incorporates this range of emotional complexity into an easily digestible 32-minute time frame while taking her boldest musical steps to date.

Cowboy opens with the album’s first lead single, “Geyser” - an uncharacteristically uplifting track. Emerging from lo-fi static scenery, “Geyser” evolves as a joyful production that, in its brief two and a half minute run, manages to capture the full spectrum of lust. The next track, “Why Didn’t You Stop Me?” comes as a direct contrast of the album’s first, introducing the funky ethereal synths and organs found throughout the album. With a refrain that mocks our own delusional memories of past relationships, Mitski pleads “You know me better than I do / So why didn’t you stop me?” while forcing herself onto the dance floor alone.

Be the Cowboy’s most delicate moments come when Mitski exposes and pokes fun

Designer: Jacqueline Arce (Experience Design)

I usually have a definable gut reaction of either love or hate to new Eminem albums. Often those reactions manifest as uncompromising admiration or searing criticism for one reason or another, like the coherent messages and self-awareness of The Eminem Show or the mystifying lack of hard-hitting hooks on last year’s Revival.

2018’s Kamikaze, however, has flipped my thinking. My instinctive reaction is conflicted; I waffle on whether to be impressed with Em’s characteristically unbeatable flow and precision on songs like “Lucky You,” or to feel exasperated and put off by just how tired and out of touch he comes across on the egostroking “Not Alike.” So I am forced to decide if Kamikaze is what fans actually deserved in place of Revival or simply another LP in a growing line of attempts to stay afloat the swamps of obsolescence to hold on to the last drops of public notoriety he has left.

I’ll say one thing for Kamikaze: for all the lack of humility and unabashed anger towards pretty much anyone with a heartbeat, Eminem does come across as quite human.

He runs us through his mental ups and downs following the critical panning of Revival, instinctively acting defensive of his recent work but wallowing in defeat just a few bars later. Opener “The Ringer” is a good example of this confliction, with Em childishly declaring how he wants to “punch the world in the face” in the first lines while lamenting his

shrunken fanbase following his 2017 Trumpbashing BET freestyle just a verse later. Just as I feel torn about the album, Eminem feels torn about his entire recent output, and that only makes him all the more human and relatable. These moments that capture this duality are limited to this track and the Joyner Lucas-assisted “Lucky You” however.

On one-sided songs like “The Greatest” and “Fall,” I can’t help but cringe as I listen to Eminem claim sole lasting influence on the genre (Even if there’s truth to it). The main issue with the complaints seem to be their baselessness; I’m not really a mumble rap fan either, but I can at least understand its appeal without announcing to the world that everything that came before it is superior.

Where Kamikaze gets away from looking backwards and masturbating into the mirror is where it can start endearing itself. The emotional announcement of D12’s breakup and Eminem’s guilt surrounding his breakoff from the group make “Stepping Stone” feel impactful enough to warrant multiple listens, and Eminem’s token songs about his dysfunctional relationship with women (“Normal,” and the double-hit of “Nice Guy” and “Good Guy”) at least distract from the monotony of the album’s predominant themes (even if they aren’t the most intriguing or re-listenable songs). But like the duality of “The Ringer,” these interesting moments are too few and far between, and make Kamikaze feel like a bit of a slog, despite its short 46-minute runtime.

Music critics, especially after Revival, have been quick to label Eminem as the relic of a bygone age of music, a remnant of the MTV era if you will. Kamikaze is a strange case in that it both debunks and reinforces that sentiment. It does remind us that, after all these years, Marshall Mathers is as technically proficient on the mic as ever, and knows how to skirt swiftly between snarky referential humor and rapid fire bursts of anger in his trademark style. But that rage and passion simply doesn’t carry the same weight it did in the early 2000’s. So it’s hard to feel an excess of goodwill towards Kamikaze when the disses feel more petty, contrived, and anemic than ever, and its entire purpose seems to be to stay perched on a high horse and preach the good old days to a crowd that has clearly stopped listening.

While I can praise Kamikaze for its technical chops, I can hardly recommend a project that feels like I’ve walked in on Eminem punching a wall and touching himself.

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at her own vulnerabilities. On the impassive “Old Friend,” Mitski allows herself to meet with an old romance to “talk about nothing,” specifically lingering, unspoken emotions.

On the folksier “Me and My Husband,” (opening with a drawn-out sigh – perhaps the most Mitski addition), Mitski’s hypothetical insistence that, “Me and my husband / We’re sticking together / Me and my husband / We are doing better,” leave listeners believing anything but. With “Pink in the Night,” a staple track that reminds the audience this album is more hopeful at its core, Mitski shares “I glow pink in the night in my room / I’ve been blossoming alone over you.”

On this song, Mitski indulges in the rosier parts of a relationship, an adolescent vulnerability that has always suited her well whenever she decides to divulge.

Just after the album’s halfway mark, “Nobody” is timed perfectly as a hysterical disco anthem that ponders solitude and overconsumption on Venus. Mitski’s claim that “I don’t want your pity / I just want somebody near me” is as candid as it cathartic, and these pleas for the absolute minimal level of companionship feel like Mitski at her most self-assured. On “Nobody’s” outro, Mitski’s voice is steady in its repetition before launching into a frenzied, almost automatic embrace of loneliness.

After several other innovative tracks comes the album’s shimmering exit, “Two Slow Dancers.” While the track veers from the album’s otherwise amusing and unassuming narrative tone, its unrestrained longing for how things used to be prevails just the same. “To think that we could stay the same,” Mitski laments, as the song and album’s harmony fades.

Be the Cowboy’s songs, intentional in their brevity, come as episodic jabs that chronicle a wider scope of memories. Stylistically, Mitski permits our wailing and self-pity for an average of two and a half minutes, after which it’s time for us to move on. There’s a consistency to Mitski’s music across her five-album discography, one that confronts anxiety, ephemeral love and waning selfworth as mere givens. With each record, she’s developed a firmer grasp on what she wants her art to say to the world while experiencing a fading sense of stability and expecting help from no one along the way.

Vishal Makhijani (Politics, Philosophy, and Economics)

Fall 2018

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Aphex Twin

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Collapse

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Release Date September 14 Label Warp Genre Experimental Electronic Dance Music Tasty Tracks “1st 44”, “Abundance10edit[2 R8’s, FZ20m & a 909]”

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What has Richard D. James brewed in his electronic music laboratory this time? The producer faces a second wind after his spotlighted and prolific ‘90s output, but his release schedule is much more controlled this decade. One thing remains constant: his Aphex Twin moniker gives him the most attention so he can present new creations in his music like an electronic science fair. And much like a mad scientist, he manipulates his gear to perform outside of its capabilities.

Collapse is a half hour testament to the intent to contort the constraints of his gear and a perplexing yet ultimately rewarding exploration into James’ current sonic palette.

James makes his gear use most overt in the fourth track by listing various 1980s synthesizers and samplers in the title. The drum patterns show that the primitive instrumentation does not at all inhibit his abilities to make a lot with a little: the synthetic claps that punctuate the dense percussion rise and fall in sampled pitch, creating an understandable melody. The outro of “1st 44” simulates the sounds of war with the title, but James opts to use simple drum sounds to convey a ridiculously potent sensation of hearing bombs from the perspective of an soldier swimming underwater towards Normandy beach in WW2. The title of the EP hints at his intentions to see his rhythm and melodies fall into disarray, only to be salvaged into something even more interesting. I trace this electronic schadenfreude to James’ notoriety as a vigilante, from the structure of his songs to his strange album covers and marketing campaigns. The juxtaposition of his ideas becomes almost too perplexing on “MT1 T29R2,” but the introductory track “T69 Collapse” succeeds perfectly: much like in the accompanying music video and cover art, James creates a soundtrack to a green pasture sinking into ruin, only to resurface stronger than before.

James’ desire to restrain his gear as a challenge to create synthetic soundscapes points to other dualities I found in the music that bring out the best of both worlds.

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The melodies often shift from sweet to uneasy. I noticed James’ current interest in microtuning (the ability to create pitches between conventional notes in western scales) from a wonderful 2017 interview with a former Korg engineer, which may have had a factor in why some melodies sound eerily flat or sharp. Microtuning is usually found in avant-garde and non-western musical traditions, so its use in dance music gives more character to the melodies.

Sounds come simple in nature or intensely rhythmic, like the lassoing bassline of closing track “pthex.” James enhances vintage synthesizers sounds with punchy production augmented by the chaotic, panoramic mixing emblematic of modern electronic music.

Most importantly, this effort from James borders the line between a mind trip and a dance affair. I want to assure those without knowledge of synth hardware or wary of the pretentious label of “intelligent dance music” that this EP can be enjoyed on a purely groove-based level in the context of a club. Some may say his creative glory days are over, but James proves with Collapse that his “findings” continue to be worth sharing.

Chris Miller (Music Industry)

Come back to earth:

is hip-hop too high?

“How much xans and lean do you have to do before you realize you’re a f*cking loser?”

This question was printed on the shirt of polarizing rapper Russ just over a year ago. Social media outlets were promptly flooded with artists and hip-hop heads alike weighing in on this bold statement, and the late Chicago rapper Fredo Santana retorted at the time: “Until I can stop thinking about my dead homies and the trauma that I been thru in my life…”

Just a couple of months later, the controversy got even bigger, and a whole lot sadder, when experimental emo rapper Lil Peep died of an accidental drug overdose. If Russ’ provocative ways weren’t enough to get everyone talking, this tragedy certainly pushed people over the edge. Responses varied, with some calling out the new generation of rappers for being drugged-out zombies, and others sympathizing and understanding the pain and drug abuse; plenty sat in between.

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Unfortunately, Lil Peep is no longer the focal point for such debate, as another drug overdose in hip-hop has left us all without Mac Miller.

A beloved figure throughout the industry and a crowd favorite, Miller was always honest about his struggles with addiction and otherwise. On his last album, Swimming, he appeared to have a newfound acceptance of life and its troubles, demonstrating positivity and growth, which only made the news of his death more shattering. Whether or not the overdose was intentional, Miller is the latest in a long, sad line to reignite the conversation around drugs in hip-hop.

However, this discussion is nothing new — hip-hop and drugs have always had a complicated, fluctuating relationship. The late ‘80s through the early 2000s featured abundant rappers boasting about (or advising against) selling drugs, namely Notorious B.I.G., Jay-Z, UGK, Wu-Tang Clan, and N.W.A. The 1987 track “Dopeman”

by N.W.A. doesn’t leave much to the imagination, with the hook chanting, “Dopeman, dopeman! Hey man give me a hit Dopeman, dopeman! … We just can’t quit.” Drug usage, however, was mostly limited to weed, with Dr. Dre’s The Chronic and the mere presence of Snoop Dogg leading the way. Drugs were more of a means to get by financially, not emotionally.

Designer: Anna Rychlik (Business Administration & Design)

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“it’s increasingly difficult to listen to a popular hiphop song that doesnt mention the use of prescription drugs in one way or another.”

The current picture of drugs in hip-hop began to reveal itself in the late 2000s when Lil Wayne took the rap game by storm, bringing with him an obsession with lean, a concoction of a soft drink and codeine, that remains intact — both in his personal life and in the rap game. Although the origins of lean (also known as purple drank, dirty sprite, sizzurp, etc.) in hip-hop really got started in the late ‘90s with Three 6 Mafia, it was Lil Wayne that brought it into the mainstream, blurring the lines between drugs and his music beyond recognition. On the concerning 2007 track titled “I Feel Like Dying,” Wayne raps, “Jumping off of a mountain into a sea of Codeine / I’m at the top of the top, but, still I climb.”

Thus began the widespread usage and endorsement of prescription drugs, with Xanax and Percocet being current staples.

Rappers like Future (who has two projects named after lean), Lil Uzi Vert, Migos, Young Thug, and (obviously) Lil Xan helped define this trend, and now it’s impossible to avoid. It’s increasingly difficult to listen to a popular hip-hop song that doesn’t mention the use of prescription drugs in one way or another.

But it’s not all glorification: Chance the Rapper has talked about how Xanax almost ruined his career, and his idol-turned-mentor Kanye West released an entire album baring his addictions and demons. And Drake, in the most Drake way possible, rapped about how he takes half a Xanax to sleep on 13-hour flights.

Additionally, a number of new wave rappers, often blamed for creating this drug-addicted culture, have taken steps toward sobriety, publicly announcing their decisions to quit lean, Xanax, or other prescription-turned-recreational drugs. SoundCloud rappers Lil Pump, Smokepurpp, and Famous Dex were among some of the bigger names, with Famous Dex stating “If I’m your role model, then stop f*cking doing the lean…” (yes, Famous Dex may actually be some kids’ role model). While their statements may be insincere or insufficient given their impact, it does hint at some maturity and gives some hope for those disappointed and distraught with the current state of hip-hop and its pervasive, destructive drug problem.

Did someone say disappointed with the current state of hiphop? Enter J. Cole. If these new wave rappers are the irresponsible, rebellious children of hip-hop, J. Cole is the wise father trying to correct their ways before it’s too late. His newest album, K.O.D., which stands for Kids on Drugs, Kill Our Demons, and/or King Overdose, is dedicated to the current climate of hip-hop and drugs. Full of verses pleading against drug abuse, often alongside personal anecdotes, the album caused many fans to write Cole off for being too preachy, undermining his platform and purpose.

So what’s the use? How can you persuade a generation of rappers that aren’t listening? Who has the right to tell these artists what they should and shouldn’t do? No, there isn’t a right answer to any of these questions, and that’s why this still is, and always will be, an ongoing conversation. It’s hard to attack individuals when the reasons behind abusive drug use are often systematic; it’s not a coincidence that rappers that have endured adversity and trauma often turn to drugs as an escape — Fredo Santana was not alone in his sentiment. It may be a stretch to equate hip-hop’s love of prescription drugs with the 1980s crack epidemic, but both can be attributed to institutionalized racism.

“Additionally, a number of new wave rappers, often blamed for creating this drug-addicted culture, have taken steps toward sobriety.”

But how can the hip-hop community sit back and allow this trend to take the lives of both artists and fans? Is self-expression a sufficient excuse for this terrifying influence? Lil Wayne has suffered a series of serious seizures, and UGK lost half of its genius with the loss of Pimp C. Houston legend DJ Screw never got to experience his posthumous fame, and larger-than-rap collective A$AP Mob lost its founder in A$AP Yams. Across all of these examples, and countless others, lean and/or Xanax are to blame. Those close to these artists often beg fans not to indulge in such abusive behavior, yet rarely bring this message into their music. And when artists like J. Cole and Russ do take a stand, their methods are largely seen as cringey or offensive.

This paradoxical relationship is hip-hop’s unfortunate reality.

Feel confused, maybe overwhelmed? Need a way out of your head?

So did Mac Miller: “I just need a way out of my head / I’ll do anything for a way out of my head.” Ask your loved ones if they’re doing okay, make clear your care and concern. RIP Mac. • Miles Kirsch (Bioengineering ‘19)

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Cover Story

you better work that purse first:

the importance of

DRAG MUSIC

(As a white gay man with no personal background in drag or connection to the roots of drag culture and performance, I can only provide an outside viewpoint on a community which I admire on a deep level. With this article, I can truly only scratch the surface on drag music, its influences, and its key players, and by no means should my sole perspective be taken as read. I am simply an enthusiast with a love for the community, a decent-sized knowledgebase of its music, and a penchant to dance in my car to the hits of Alaska Thunderfuck.)

Fall 2018

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The Key Inf luences The club scene is predominantly what has influenced the drag music of the world, and the list of significant musicians that dominated the dance and electronic charts during the earlier days of drag as we know it today is virtually endless. That being said, there were some key players in the music scene that passed direct influence on to modern drag musicians, stretching from the '50s to the early 2000s.

THE ANDROGYNES MOVEMENT Given the rise of androgyny in fashion via the likes of Twiggy, it is no surprise that the androgynous players of the music industry lent their charms and inspiration to drag music. Grace Jones and Annie Lennox were easily the widest reaching of the bunch: Grace touched the souls of many LGBTQ clubgoers with disco hits like “Pull Up to the Bumper” and “La vie en rose,” and Annie inspired tomboys and girls everywhere to chop their locks down to almost nothing and swagger about to “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This).”

THE DIVAS This section truly could go on forever, as to condense down the life and significance of every diva that inspired drag across the globe is not a task worth undertaking. But songs like Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive,” Chaka Khan’s “I’m Every Woman” and all the hits of Cher, Tina Turner, and Diana Ross were just some of the many tunes ingrained into the veins of queer culture, and are all considered lip sync staples in the western world.

THE MODERN POP PRINCESSES While queens today are inspired by current pop idols like Lorde or P!nk, the late '90s and early 2000s saw the rise of the bubblegum pop craze, and thus a new genre of drag music emerged. The explosion of Madonna and Britney Spears, the undisputed pop goddesses of their times, gave way to a new wave of dance hits and made songs like “Oops… I Did it Again” and “Vogue” into new lip-sync standards.

Designer: Claudia Bracy (Design)

Many things lie at the heart of international drag culture. Surely the epitome of drag philosophy is sisterhood, LGBTQ love, and a community of self-professed freaks who band together to entertain with a bold statement of gender fuckery. Drag is an inherently political statement, a proud announcement of nonconformity to the status quo of traditional roles of gender, sex, race, and everything in between, and one of the many things that drives the community and binds its members together is the music within it.

“Drag music” can be anything from the club staples ingrained into the collective minds of clubgoers to music by drag queens themselves. For the purposes of this piece, “drag music” refers to the latter. Drag music, while outwardly appearing “shallow” or “trashy,” has an important entrenchment in the history of drag: it offers not only a sense of community, but provides something special, something that is uniquely theirs. It brings about diversity as well, as the many talented voices of drag have often used their musical platform to enhance their careers; just this year, drag performer Peppermint became the first trans woman to originate a role on Broadway in the critically adored Head Over Heels. The music celebrates all that drag embodies: camaraderie, absurdity, filth, glamor, and a sense that, no matter where you listen to it, you can emerge from the shadows to join a place in which you feel you belong.

Recent drag music has stretched multiple genres, but its roots stem from the club scene of the '70s, '80s, and '90s, and evolved from there to become its own bona fide art form.

So as a means of scratching the surface, here is a very brief outlining of some of the most important players in drag music, from its diva influences to the key players of today.

The Proto-Popular Music of Drag Queens To the masses uninitiated into the innerworkings and history of drag and ball culture, RuPaul may be the current figurehead for the community, but he is only one of quite a few highly influential and groundbreaking queens to emerge in the '80s and '90s. When it comes to producing music, these are the true forerunners who set the club ablaze.

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Cover Story

DIVINE An original drag renaissance woman, Divine will forever be associated with cult LGBTQ filmmaker John Waters and her roles in his films like Pink Flamingoes and Hairspray.

In her short lifetime she laid much of the groundwork for future drag musicians with disco hits “Native Love (Step By Step),” “You Think You’re a Man,” and “I’m So Beautiful.”

ADORE DELANO

For those not in the know on ball culture history, Kevin Aviance is nothing short of a dance music legend. With 3 No. 1’s on the Billboard Top Dance Club charts (and 2 more that breached the top 10) like the infectious “Din Da Da,” Aviance taught the entire underground “Work. Fierce. Over. Aviance.”

Adore is one of the most beloved characters to come from the Drag Race circuit, and as such not only has the largest social media following of all the Ru Girls, but also has the highest charting music (her first LP, Til Death Do Us Party peaked at No. 59 on the Billboard Hot 100). That’s not surprising considering she is also an American Idol alum, but Adore has proven that drag music can have far more range than just club appeal with grunge efforts like “Negative Nancy” and “Whole 9 Yards.”

RUPAUL

TRIXIE MATTEL

As I mentioned, Ru was the first (and still most predominant) mainstream queen of the '90s, thanks in large part to his groundbreaking spokeswoman gig for MAC Cosmetics and trailblazing “Supermodel (You Better Work).” Using his tv show Drag Race as a reliable workhorse for featuring his tunes season after season, he has suckered in legions of new fans and keeps churning out hit after hit, like banger “Call Me Mother.”

Like Adore before her, Tracy Martell showed us that drag queens who make music don’t have to be confined to the club. The selfprofessed “best drag folk artist” has been successfully releasing country tunes like “Mama Don’t Make Me Put on the Dress Again” for the last year or so and is showing no signs of letting up during her Drag Race: All-Stars reign.

The New Influx of Contemporary Queens

While he has no full LPs, a special shoutout goes to Bob the Drag Queen’s “Purse First,” for bringing the niche references and cultural happenings of the ball scene (many of which come from the documentary Paris is Burning) into the mainstream.

KEVIN AVIANCE

Drag music has made something of a massive resurgence in the last decade or so thanks to the overwhelming popularity of RuPaul’s Drag Race, with all but one winner and virtually every other contestant releasing music shortly after their time on the show. While more does not necessarily equal better (looking at you Manila Luzon), there certainly has been some significant music to come from the Ru Girls, some of whom have made considerable jumps into the mainstream.

ALASKA THUNDERFUCK Alaska (or Alaska Thunderfuck 5000, to call her by her full name) has one of the more prolific music careers of the Ru Girls, despite only having released two studio albums (Anus and Poundcake, respectively). Alaska’s music quintessentially embodies the idea of “by drag queens, for drag queens” and consistently laces itself with in-jokes, snarky Fall 2018

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drag witticisms, and references to Drag Race.

Songs like “Your Makeup is Terrible,” “Stun,” and “Come to Brazil” prove that she doesn’t really care if you don’t get it.

BOB THE DRAG QUEEN

• Jason Levy (Marketing)

IN DEFENSE OF KE$HA’S

There is something to be said for the shallow, the commonplace, and there is something radical in the rejection of critical narrative. It would be willful ignorance to suggest Kesha was oblivious to this idea while creating Animal. What made it so difficult to celebrate Ke$ha, goddess of party, yet so easy to laud the solemn, profound Kesha (sans dollar sign) of today? What made us want to control Kesha?

“TiK ToK” does not aspire to rival the philosophies of Foucault – though I could write you a compelling piece as to why it might. Pop can have meaning, but is equally special in its ability to transcend substance in favor of surface-level amusement. On one level, it’s suitable to analyze Animal as a project of non-ambition; Animal accomplishes what it sets out to do – make people dance, drink, and party – and it does so with flair. It is essentially club banger extract. There is something wonderful in the clarity of a song called “Take It Off” being about taking off your clothes and “Blah Blah Blah” being about a guy who talks too much.

Even the cuts like “Blind” and “Dancing with Tears in My Eyes” provide refreshing purity without forgetting the album’s dance roots. Pop doesn’t have to be cryptic to be delightful.

On another level, it is possible to analyze Animal’s character as a distinct choice, as a sort of meta-commentary on the pop genre. Kesha is an undeniably talented vocalist, yet we hear her talk more on the album than sing, and when she does sing it is dripping in glorious AutoTune. The yodeladjacent bridge of “TiK ToK” is so morphed from its original state it can convince you

Kesha is more extraterrestrial than human.

Even the somber ballad “Hungover” has been dressed in a club beat and synthesizer arpeggios. The album refuses to explore any motif beyond the encouragement of hedonism and celebration. Eight years after Animal’s release we understood that Kesha’s only outlet is not partying, but that she too is a product of complex internal struggles.

To refute that Kesha was conscious of the image of herself she was promoting, her artistic ability, and the nature of pop itself is jaded at best, and robs Kesha of the same self-awareness for which we appreciate Rainbow. Even without the musical triumph of Rainbow, the suggestion of Kesha’s obliviousness to the character of her debut promotes a paradox: In order for Kesha to be understand as a conscious authority in her music, she must be profound, denying her that same authority to choose to be vapid.

Animal didn’t change brains, but it was never meant to. Kesha’s debut was an exercise in the artfulness of minimalism; not in the production style abused by pop artists today, but rather in storytelling and morality. It is unsurprising that Kesha was able to continue touring with these songs for years after their release while pursuing her legal battle with Dr. Luke: between now and a decade ago, we all still find ourselves wanting to have fun.

Designer: Ryan Fleischer (Design and Marketing)

Animal • Nikolas Greenwald (Chemical Engineering)

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An interview with

Interview

TANCRED

Photos by Rio Asch Phoenix See more photos at tastemakersmag.com

Before gracing the Afterhours stage at this year’s Tastemakers Presents concert, Jess Abbot of Tancred sat down with two of our writers, Emma Turney and Maya Dengel. They talked about her background, future, and influences old and new. Covering everything from Minneapolis to Mac Miller, check out our conversation with Tancred!

Tastemakers Magazine (TMM): What made you decide to take Tancred from your side project to your main focus?

Jesse Abbott (JA): Now, Now was on hiatus for a really long time and I was just kinda sitting around so I was like, I should just do this and start touring with it and that was pretty much how it got started, when I started doing it more than just a recording project.

TMM: So you were working on Tancred at the same time as you were in Now, Now? JA: Oh yeah. I started it as a recording project for fun, and there was really no intention of it other than that. In Now, Now, the creative process was really shared between the 3 of us, and I just wanted to have something fun where I could put all of the ideas that didn’t fit with Now, Now. Once they went out on a hiatus, I started doing it more seriously.

TMM: Was it hard to do both at the same time?

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JA: No, because it was just for fun at first. Then, when I started doing it full time, I had been doing nothing for years, so it didn’t interfere at all .

TMM: And you started your career in Minneapolis, which is where I’m from. How do you think the city’s scene impacted your development as a musician?

JA: Well, it definitely impacted me a lot because the Minneapolis music scene is nothing like the Boston scene at all. They’re so different. Minneapolis was more gentle, creative indie stuff happening, and over here it was a lot more pop-punk and hardcore, and I wasn’t aware of any pop-punk/hardcore happening in Minneapolis at any point. But that was what I grew up in. And then, when I went to Minneapolis, I was experiencing so many different things that it definitely changed for sure how I wrote. And the other two people from Now, Now were born and raised in Minnesota, so what they brought and what I learned to work with really shaped my creative process because I was, like, 18 when I joined them. I was learning everyday.

TMM: Speaking on that, how do you think your music has changed since you were so young when you started? The first couple of Tancred albums are a lot more pop-punk, but the most recent album has a much different feel.

JA: When you say first one being pop-punk, do you mean Out of the Garden?

TMM: Very true.

JA: Also John Mayer’s album Continuum.

TMM: No, your very first few releases, Capes and Tancred.

TMM: I just recently got back into the album too!

JA: Oh, good! Some people always call Out of the Garden pop-punk and I’m like … what?! I think like anyone when you learn and grow you can hone in more on stuff you like and are good at. I grew up on a lot of hardcore/emo music [on the east coast] and had a lot of fun with that, but I think it was something that was really crucial for me learning how to play guitar in certain ways, but ultimately it wasn’t my favorite thing at the end of the day when I started to learn more about different genres and writing styles. Being in Now, Now exposed me to so many different genres and writing styles, and I was just growing up the whole time. Each of my records are so different, I think, because I started so young and wasn’t really sure of the music I was trying to make. Even now, it’s way too early to think about another album, but I have a few ideas of things I want to do, and they’re not things I’ve done before.

I’m always all over the place in terms of things I want to do and like to make. I think that’s just from getting old.

TMM: What were some of your major inspirations when you were younger compared to what you listen to now?

JA: There are somethings that never change, like The Cure, and Portishead, and Letters to Cleo and...

JA: There were definitely touchstone things that came in and out.

Like when I was 17 or 18 it was American Football every day, and then after that it became a weird Say Anything phase for a year, and then I learned about That Dog. Because Letters to Cleo was really huge in the 90s grunge scene, but I didn’t really go farther than that in terms of investigating it, and someone was like, if you like that, you should listen to That Dog. I put it off and put it off and one day actually sat down and was like “Holy shit, I need to digest any band that sounds anything like this.” And then I wrote Out of the Garden, and that’s still some of my favorite stuff. I wouldn’t call that a phase I’m over, but I definitely felt like with Out of the Garden I tapped into that and what I could do with that. Then, I was listening to a lot of different stuff that inspired my newest album—I was listening to a lot of Ida Maria and Darwin Dez and Regina Spektor and stuff that was a lot more gentle but poppy.

I wanted to do something that tones it down a little bit. I don’t know what I’m going to do next, but I’ve been listening to a lot of R&B lately, and I am not going to try to do that.

[Everyone laughs] TMM: What have you been listening to recently within R&B?

TMM: It’s so good!

JA: Oh, my god it’s awesome. And Noname and The Internet and the Ariana Grande album. It’s all so good. Oh and Charli XCX and always Britney Spears – she never gets old.

TMM: That was my favorite album in 10th grade. It was the only thing I was listening to.

JA: I’m so jealous, I remember everyone being into it.

TMM: And you touched on this a bit with the R&B, but do you have any aspirations you want to go for with your next album?

JA: I have no idea, and it really changes every day. It’s just stressful. I’m envious of artists that have similar sounding records, because mine sound like me I guess, but aesthetically I’m always changing my mind about what I want to be doing. Sometimes, I worry that that’s picked up in it, like you can tell I’m figuring it out. It’s complicated to figure out what I want to do, so I just take it one day at a time.

TMM: Have you started writing anything new?

JA: No, I mean I have some voice memos about recording things like a guitar lick, but that’s about it.

TMM: So, a song on Nightstand that I’m obsessed with is “Rowing”.

I think it’s so different than all of your other music, so I’m curious if, when you were making that, you were trying to make something different?

JA: I feel like there was a specific song that inspired me to write that one, and I’m trying to remember what it is.

TMM: It really reminds me of Julien Baker, and I saw you guys were on tour together.

JA: It’s funny you say that, because [“Rowing”] is actually Julien [Baker]’s favorite Tancred song.

TMM: I just got into Julien Baker a couple of months ago, so when I heard Rowing, it really reminded me of her. Especially since a lot of the other stuff on your album is so different from that song.

JA: I had never listened to Julien’s music until after I made the album and I listened to her Song Exploder episode that was about her opening track on her new album, so it’s interesting that you would say that. I guess because [“Rowing”] is really emotional. I was listening to a lot of Angel Olsen when I wrote that, and I loved how she could play something so simple, but it would have so much power behind that.

Pretty much every time I write a song I’m just sittin’ down playing a guitar part, but the only album I can remember sitting down and

Designer: Aarti Amalean (Design)

JA: I’ve just been listening to 5 albums on repeat, like the new Mac Miller album.

JA: I had never really gotten in to it [when it was released], and now I’m like … this is so good.

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specifically trying to write something that sounded like something was Out of the Garden. I feel like you can tell, because the whole album sounds like they flow from one into the other, which I didn’t do for Nightstand, which is why all the songs sound so different.

TMM: Do you have an album or song that you are most proud of releasing so far?

Interview

JA: Probably Nightstand, but I also really feel that way about Out of the Garden. I feel proud of them both for different reasons. The new album Nightstand because I explored a lot of things I hadn’t before, like writing and arranging strings. There were also a lot of songs on Nightstand that I was very meticulous about drum parts for. I’ve always done a basic outline of drum parts for all of my albums, and then had a drummer fill it in, but with Nightstand I would sit there for hours taking one measure at a time, because I didn’t know what I was doing, but I knew what I wanted it to sound like. “Rowing” was one of those that I wrote drums for. But Out of the Garden I’m also really proud of because I feel like that’s the album that I had wanted to write since I was 10, and then I finally did it. I don’t think there’s anything I would change about that album.

JA: I just love Riverdale. That’s pretty much it. We were supposed to do the video with a director who had written out a whole different treatment for it. Like, there were going to be horses and a haunted hotel and fire and there was some kind of miscommunication, and we couldn’t do the video with her anymore. So we had to figure something out quickly. I wanted to use Jason Lester, who did the “Bad Case” music video, and my friend was like ‘You should do a Riverdale video,’ and I was like, ‘Okay.’ So then I pitched it, and I had my friend Britney in it, and it all just came together like that in a day. But I have been super obsessed with Riverdale and it just seemed fun. I knew someone was going to do a Riverdale video eventually, so I was like, ‘I should do it and make it gay.’

TMM: Are you supposed to be Jughead in it? I feel like it switches.

JA: I play Jughead, Tony, and Veronica. And Britney is Archie, Betty and Cheryl.

TMM: Love it! Well, we’re really looking forward to your set tonight.

Thanks for sitting down with us!

JA: Yeah, thank you!

TMM: So we watched the music video for “Something Else,” which was inspired by the show, Riverdale. What made you want to make something with inspiration from Riverdale?

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• Maya Dengel (Communications & Media Screen Studies) Emma Turney (Communications)

BLAC K

BAD

Eyeliner

Haircuts,

Emo music and style connects some of us to one of our better times: puberty. And just as quickly as we all grew out of that phase (yes, for some it is just a phase), so did the artists we modeled our choices on. The bands that made us feel like our 13-year-old anger was justified have grown into adults with

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EMO KIDS ?

proper haircuts and full grown children, and their music has evolved along with them. While some bands grew with their fans, others lost touch with them. What is it that allows bands like Paramore to continue with success, while others like All Time Low burnt out?

MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE

ALL TIME LOW

Although All Time Low are still commercially successful, with their 2017 album Last Young Renegade debuting at number nine on the U.S. Billboard 200, the band have mostly lost their initial emo fan base.

The problem isn’t that the new album is bad. The issue that many early, hardcore fans have had is that Last Young Renegade is far off of what made All Time Low an emo staple. It is as pop as rock-pop can possibly get, with big hooks and even a feature from fellow pop-turned

officially broke up in 2013 and Way, moved on to a short, forgettable solo career. Way is now 41 years old, married and a father to a nine-year-old girl (feel old yet?). He is pursuing a passion he had in college, comic book writing.

But no matter where Way’s career goes, he is questioned by fans about when My Chemical Romance will get back together, and he continuously responds that they have already accomplished what they set out to do. Alas, I still find myself listening to songs off of The Black Parade frequently, as they have stood the test of time.

artists Tegan and Sara. As the members of All Time Low enter their 30s, their fan base still stays majorly in their young teens. With fiancés and clean haircuts, the members are unrecognizable from the days of straightened side swept bangs and half bleached hair that defined the era of emo-essential “Dear Maria, Count Me In.” Even though I am often a fan of anything Tegan and Sara sign their names onto, I still find myself listening to earlier All Time Low before venturing into anything recent they’ve made.

Designer: Kat Minor (Graphic Design & Game Design)

My Chemical Romance technically peaked before many of us millennials reached our emo middle school days. However, their pinnacle album, The Black Parade, was a defining work of music during our impressionable adolescent years. The beginning keys to “Welcome to the Black Parade” have become this rallying cry for anyone who used to mimic lead singer Gerard Way’s hair colors with red KoolAid (yes I was one of those). However, Way has said that he felt he could never top what the band did with The Black Parade, and even though their following releases had some memorable moments, Way was still mostly right. The band

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Feature Good Charlotte varies from their contemporaries in that their peak came quickly and departed just as fast. Their 2002 sophomore album The Young & The Hopeless launched them into mainstream success, placed them amongst the greatest pop-punk bands of the early 2000s reemergence of emo, and brought with that rise emo rites of passage like the cocky “The Anthem,” the anger driven “Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous,” and the catchy “Girls & Boys.” Over the next six years, Good Charlotte struggled to return to the music of their early days, and eventually, in 2011, they announced that the band was going on hiatus. In 2015, they joined back together to

release their sixth album Youth Authority. But even the band themselves have admitted that Youth Authority was not the music they came back to create, and longtime fans seemed to agree. But just this year Good Charlotte released their most vulnerable album to date titled Generation Rx, following the opioid overdose of rapper Lil Peep.

After so many years since the band released anything worthy of a second listen, I don’t know if it’s possible for them to gain any new momentum.

But the jury’s still out on whether Generation Rx will catapult Good Charlotte back into relevancy.

Over the years, Paramore has seemed more like a reality show than a band. With multiple past members going public with allegations that frontwoman Hayley Williams treated the band like her own solo project (including a lawsuit by former bassist Jeremy Davis which was just settled last year), the band really has become centered around Williams, the only member to appear on every album. The band rocketed to mainstream success with the release of their 2007 sophomore album Riot!, which earned them a Best New Artist Grammy nomination. The head-banging, angry sound of their early years was reflected in Williams’ style, and she became known for her signature neon-colored bob. But like many other emo bands of the early 2000s, Paramore eventually had to grow up

and leave their teenage sound and looks behind.

Now with long blonde hair, Williams has figuratively and literally changed the face of Paramore. Their 2017 album After Laughter is the opposite of what we’ve come to know, with lyrics about mental health over vibrant 80s pop-synth. It feels mature and meticulously put together, reflecting the past four years of growing up that the band has been through.

It’s personally one of my favorite albums of 2017, and quite possibly my favorite record Paramore has put out. What makes Paramore’s departure from emo different than their contemporaries is that the record still feels honest to the band, not like a copy and pasted collection of other big pop artists today.

My Chemical Romance

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With emo classics like “Dance, Dance” and “Sugar We’re Goin Down,” Fall Out Boy have become a template for current pop-punk bands to follow. That is interesting, considering most of their discography at this point isn’t even pop-punk, and the band themselves have been trying to depart from the genre as early as 2005. They have a recipe for their success: bassist Peter Wentz writes the lyrics, and lead singer Patrick Stump writes the music and, unlike many of their contemporaries, they didn’t suffer as much internal drama that took away from the music. After a four-year hiatus, Fall Out Boy came back to create their most pop album to date, ironically titled Save Rock and Roll. The dramatic and truly emo announcement of their return proved how serious the

Panic! at the Disco has constantly been playing with their sound and instrumentation. With the band’s debut album, A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out, organized as half pop-punk and half traditional music, it’s no surprise that fans have been open to shifts in style from album to album. Over their fourteen-year career, many have joined and left Panic! at the Disco, leaving frontman Brenden Urie as the sole member since 2015. With one of the most versatile voices in modern music, Urie is like

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band was about leaving the early 2000s in the early 2000s with a photo of all four members throwing their old records into a fire. While Save Rock and Roll had several redeeming songs, the same couldn’t be said for its follow up, American Beauty/American Psycho, and in 2017 the band released their most perplexing record to date, the EDM influenced M A N I A. So we all still took time to listen to Fall Out Boy’s latest venture. I’m not sure if that’s because we still believe in their ability to make relevant, unique music, or if we’re still clinging on to the days of eyeliner-wearing Pete Wentz, but, either way, we’re still listening.

a modern day Freddie Mercury (they even have the same four octave vocal range). His experimentation with style and other art forms (most notably his brief stint in Broadway’s Kinky Boots) has no doubt had an influence on the band’s ever-changing sound. As Urie expands his interests, I think his music has only gotten better. His 2016 album Death of a Bachelor felt like one of his most thorough works to date.

• Emma Turney (Communications)

New Album Released: Billboard Top

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SO, WHAT EXACTLY IS Editorial

We’ve all heard of Lo-Fi music. It’s hard to avoid what seems to be an endless amount of “jazz vibes” and “chill lo-fi beats” playlists on Spotify and YouTube. Bedroom pop, however, isn’t as common of a phrase despite it being one of the most prevalent subgenres of lo-fi music. Originally, the term lo-fi music was used to categorize music that sounded as if it had a low production value as you could hear background noises or the noises from the recording tools and instruments themselves. The tracks tended to focus solely on fitting into the lo-fi sound by paying a fair amount of attention to the instrumentation of the track while working these sounds in and utilizing sampling.

Though lo-fi music is a large genre itself, it and all its sub-genres fall under the umbrella of DIY music. This is a broad category and not all artists who make DIY music necessarily fall into the lo-fi or bedroom pop genre. Artists such as Brockhampton started in home studios and created what would classify as DIY music but didn’t set out to achieve the “lo-fi” sound. Now, this term seems to be more of an overarching one as many think that it classifies any kind of DIY music as opposed to tracks that fit the specific lo-fi feel.

Lo-fi music didn’t always strive to have the low production sound to which we’ve become accustomed. This sound wasn’t always intentional and came about only

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BEDROOM POP ? because the music being produced was done so in the quickest and cheapest way possible on whatever equipment was available. Those who made music in their rooms at the time would use whatever synthesizer they could get their hands on, and a keyboard, and record the music straight to a tape recorder. The term DIY became more popular as certain artists veered away from working with large labels, and certain recording equipment became available to a wide range of people to use. Artists began to employ samples from older songs and started seeking out older equipment to add a certain flair and character to their music, which in turn added the lo-fi sound. Now, anyone can make music from the comfort of their own homes with just their laptop and free software.

This is where our bedroom pop artists come into play: they are artists who are getting their foot in the door of the music industry by writing and producing their tracks at home on their laptops without all of the fancy equipment and high budgets that come with producing in a studio. Often times, these artists work with what their budget allows at the time and build their way up to having a full-fledged home studio. Though the production value may be low, the tracks can still pack a punch as the lyrics tell a story over a chill or bouncy instrumental. The

CLAIRO Clairo is a Boston-based artist who started her musical career doing guitar covers on YouTube, but found her claim to fame when her song “Pretty Girl” went viral. She made this song using only Garageband and Ableton and made the accompanying music video with 30 minutes of footage on her laptop from Photobooth. A video and song that seems so simple racked up over 21 million views on YouTube. Clairo emulates the bedroom pop feel with lyrics that are relatable to her audience coupled with catchy, up-tempo beats. She recants feelings that she experiences through her teenage years and the realness of the lyrics compliment the track as the instrumentation is just as stripped down as the stories she tells through her music.

JOJI Many of these artists seem to be getting their start on YouTube, as this can be seen not only with Clairo but also Joji as well. Joji’s career had an interesting start as he was already “internet famous” under the moniker Filthy Frank. He started making music as a hobby during his time making comedic videos on YouTube, in which he managed to amass millions of subscribers before deciding to fully focus on his music career under the name of Joji in 2017. If you listen to Joji’s music, it has that scratchy sound with simple vocals that many other artists of the bedroom pop

genre seem to gravitate towards despite being signed to a label. Songs like “YEAH RIGHT” and “Will He” show how Joji is a prime example of how some artists choose to keep the lo-fi sound despite having a larger budget. Though he has the option to make music that sounds “higher quality” he prefers to stay on-brand to the lo-fi sound.

Designer: Roman Distefano (Computer Science and Design)

genuineness of the music breaks down this wall and connects the artists with the listener, and could be why this sudden wave of DIY music has been steadily on the rise. It seems as if new artists that fall under this genre are finding their way to the spotlight every week.

Though this phrase is fairly new, plenty of artists come to mind such as Clairo, Joji, Zack Villere, and Gus Dapperton, to name a few.

GUS DAPPERTON Gus Dapperton rose to fame with his song, “I’m Just Snacking.” Dapperton is an artist who’s been looped into the bedroom pop category but doesn’t necessarily have the underproduced sound like artists you usually think of when it comes to bedroom pop and lo-fi music. He’s a self-produced artist who has shown that he doesn’t necessarily fit into that box, and as can be seen in how well produced his tracks are. Dapperton is considered a bedroom pop artist by some because his tracks have the upbeat tempo and quirky instrumentation like others in the genre, but his sound comes off as more developed than that of Clairo, despite him not recording in a major label’s studio. This is in part due to the background he has in music technology, as he earned a degree from Drexel University in the subject. He really took the label of DIY music to heart as he built his home studio from the bottom in an old warehouse.

• Rayven Tate (Mechanical Engineering)

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Interview Designer: Natalie Duerr (Interaction Design)

At this semester’s Tastemakers Presents, we were lucky enough to take in a set from “crockpot Pop” outfit Queen of Jeans. Before their show they sat down with our writer, Pratik Reddy, for an interview. Check out the conversation below!

Tastemakers Magazine (TMM): So y’all are a self described “crockpot pop” band. It is such an interesting term and describes your sound pretty well. How would you guys describe crockpot pop to a potential listener?

Nina Scotto (NS): We sort of came up with it as a joke. I think we said something else into the iPhone voice recorder. I forgot what it was. But it came out as crockpot and we just went with it TMM: I listened to Dig Yourself in one sitting and especially loved its experience as a quick, 30-minute, album. So many artists in the Spotify/Apple music era have been trending towards 15-plus song albums to capitalize on streaming revenue. How have you guys been able to avoid that temptation, focusing on quality over quantity. Was it intentional or unintentional?

NS: We didn’t really pay much attention to album length. We just included the songs we felt should go together. Like yeah, some songs did end up on the cutting room floor.

Miriam Devora (MD): As far as shorter albums, like Mitski, my favorite artist, she just puts out 30-minute albums. And if you are thinking about strategy, which we weren’t, put out 30-minute album this year and another one next year. Because attention spans can be really short.

TMM: Yeah so I was going to ask whether it was intentional but it seems pretty organic.

Patrick Wall (PW): The idea of revenue from streaming songs didn’t even cross our minds till you brought it up now.

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MD: We are absolutely not at a point where that’s a thing we are considering because at the end of the day we are only getting fractions of pennies. So adding songs is not a thing we even think about now.

TMM: How do you feel up-and-coming bands should be competing, if at all, nowadays to get a slight edge in streaming/online sales?

MD: I mean with revenue, if you are an up-and-coming band you are not really making money off of your music. So I think the best way is to have clever merch and put on really good shows. That’s how you make enough money to keep your expenses in the green, so you can still tour. But we are no experts: that’s just our observation.

TMM: Your album definitely indicates that y’all know a lot and have some feelings about relationships, romantic or otherwise. Could I get a phrase of relationship advice from each of you? Just one sentence off the top of your head.

NS: Take space so you can love yourself independently before pursuing someone else.

Matheson Glass (MG): There’s a podcast called Two Dope Queens and one of their moms came on so I’m gonna steal what she said. She said to fill your lover’s tank, do small things for each other to build up everyday goodwill.

MD: Always be nice.

PW: I would just say to try to go into every relationship in a good headspace, so you aren’t focused on other things or situations.

TMM: I read your bio. You discuss the misogyny encountered while touring and how it really shaped your on-stage energy for the better.

Do you have any interesting or appalling “concert asshole” stories from your time performing?

NS: Do we ever. There was a sound guy who asked if we knew what monitors were. A ton of security guards would just refuse to let us in assuming we were just girlfriends of the “actual band.” They would always drill us or try to stop us. One guy tried to make us sign his boob.

There’s just a ton of micro…things where guys would come up to us saying “I didn’t think you guys would be good.” Which is like, thanks but no thanks. We don’t snap at them but it’s just something that should be brought up. Like how guys treat women who perform.

MD: I just wanted to note a caveat. None of the guys we have played with have been an issue. They have all been pretty respectful.

TMM: So let me ask you about your hometown, Philly, for a bit. I’m from Jersey so I’m pretty close by. What’s your favorite place to perform in the city? Like best energy, venue, etc.

MD: There’s a lot. You are basically asking what’s the best clam chowder place in Boston.

TMM: To be honest, I am not really a big chowder guy. I probably shouldn’t even say that on record.

PW: Are there a lot of places to get Clam Chowder in Boston?

Photos by Rio Asch Phoenix See more photos at tastemakersmag.com 41

TMM: There are for sure, especially by the coast. But it’s so fatty, I just stay away from it.

MD: Smart. But, In terms of actual space, playing at Union Transfer was really cool.

It’s my favorite place to see shows and it’s a beautiful venue.

Interview

TMM: I mean there are no right answers. It’s whatever your gut says.

PW: I mean there are plenty of wrong answers for sure. I think we’d go with Union Transfer.

TMM: Best Philly bar?

NS: Lucky 13 Pub! TMM: Lucky 13 Pub? So that’s unanimous consensus? Why’s that?

MD: The week when Nina and I first moved in to our neighborhood, we just decided that would be our spot. We live in an area where bars are either super bougie and expensive or like really scary and shitty. So this is like the perfect dive where you may think it’s a bit scary but the older dudes, the regulars, are super nice.

• Pratik Reddy (Math & Econ)

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MY FAVORITE SONG

�

Designer: Allison Bako (Animation)

�

By Tim DiFazio (English and Linguistics)

If there is a founding myth of the modern rapper, it goes something like this: a young kid with a rough upbringing starts rhyming in the name of class mobility. He devotes every second of his life to perfecting his craft and building his brand, and finds explosive success before his 21st birthday. He parties hard until he either dies young or lives long enough to see himself become a reality TV star.

This is, of course, a fairy tale. Nobody is more painfully aware of the lie than Danny Brown, who started rapping the moment he learned to speak. For him, the myth was not to be. He lost the better part of his twenties to the criminal justice system, spending his time either on the run or in jail. By the time he released The Hybrid, he was already 29. When his major-label debut XXX came out, he was 30. This dream deferred is the genesis of my favorite song.

But we can’t talk about “30” without situating it. If the two sides of XXX are rogue steam engines, “30” is their violent collision.

It exists in the no-man’s-land between the impish hedonism of “Adderall Admiral” and the contemplative cynicism of “DNA.” It scorches the boundary between party-rap and conscious hip-hop, leaving its remains smoldering beyond repair. In three minutes, it encapsulates everything great about Danny Brown.

“30” begins with a 6-second long, scattered drum machine solo. As the percussion stabilizes, a harsh synthesizer joins the mix as Danny Brown declares his presence with a borderline psychedelic dick joke. “Sent ya

bitch a dick pic and now she need glasses / turn ya bitch Slick Rick right now if I flashed it,” exclaims the adenoidal voice of Party Danny. This shock-jock wordplay continues as Danny drops references to Muhammed Ali, Magic Johnson, and Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan.

These bars, despite their apparent carelessness, carry a palpable anxiety.

Danny’s flow is deeply unsteady, at times slipping into a yell. His inconsistent delivery is at odds with the persistent drum machine, occasionally matching it but usually lagging ever-so-slightly behind. After a minute passes, the reason for this auditory unease becomes unsettlingly clear. “Kurt hoped the drugs would make the pain go away / but all these thoughts up in my head make the

If the two sides of XXX are rogue steam engines, then “30” is their violent collision. sane go astray,” Danny laments. He shares a recurring nightmare of himself “dying in the arms of a blond, blue-eyed 30-something” from an overdose, and he speaks for the first time on the album of a “daughter that don’t really even know him / cus’ her mama thought he wouldn’t make a living off of poems.” It’s a gut-wrenching moment, the kind that replays in your head for days afterwards. Danny’s myth, however, does not end here.

This whiplash is what makes “30” my favorite song of all time. Suddenly regaining his flow, Danny talks about his life’s journey and his grind. He claws his way out of the depths, screaming “guess what, bitch, I’m coming back!” and, less than a minute after revealing his darkest nightmare, he begins to brag. When Danny talks about his success, it feels earned. It’s the light at the end of a startlingly deep tunnel, the homecoming at the end of his odyssey.

Life, however, doesn’t tie things up so neatly. Danny’s past has left him with a lifetime of trauma and multiple addictions, and he is still experiencing its repercussions.

The song closes with a haunting confession: “The thoughts of no success got a n**** chasing death / doing all these drugs in hope of ODing next, triple X!”

As this declaration echoes in the listener’s ears, the drum machine that kicked off the song takes center stage, and we are left to reflect. In its relatively short runtime, “30” encapsulates every aspect of a great rap song. It blends outlandish wordplay, inventive delivery, and heartbreaking honesty. It’s a highly quotable, genuinely exhilarating banger.

And yet, it fundamentally challenges the archetypal rapper’s journey. Danny’s myth is not an odyssey — it’s a cycle. The ugly truth about demons is that they are resilient, and Danny knows that he will be fighting his for the rest of his life, occasionally catching his breath to tell us about it. This is the song that made me love rap. To this day, it remains unmatched.

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Editorial

growing pains: the evolution of music

Designer: Bianca Rabbie (Architecture)

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Festi The “festival bubble” is a term often used to describe the music festival market in North America and its ever-expanding nature.

Describing it as a bubble, however, implies that it will eventually pop.

It comes as no surprise that this festival market is, and has been, on the verge of bursting for the last several years. Don’t get me wrong, festivals can create some incredible experiences; a ticket to the right festival gets you in to see a ton of artists that you might not normally spend money on and often provides a weekend getaway filled to the brim with various activities, food, and culture. Unfortunately, the presence of so many festivals on the market has brought to light an increasingly noticeable trend with each passing festival season: the growing homogeneity of major festivals.

Most major cities have their own big music festival. Some notable ones include Lollapalooza in Chicago, Firefly in Dover, Boston Calling here in Boston, Governor’s Ball in NYC, Outside Lands in San Francisco, and of course, Coachella in Indio. Each festival offers its own unique aesthetic and brand, making them major destination stops for the concert-going millennials. However, as each festival strives to grow and offer bigger lineups and better amenities each year, it seems that many have started to lose their uniqueness along the way.

Across these festivals this year, many shared several of the same headliners and high-ranking performers on their billing, most of whom were located in approximately the same billing slots. Among these were names like Travis Scott, The Weeknd, The Killers, and Eminem (all headlining), Odesza, SZA, and Khalid (second line), and Brockhampton, Portugal. The Man, Manchester Orchestra, and Greta Van Fleet (3rd line or lower). Few of these festivals offered artist performances that were truly unique to their site, and it seemed

as though most major artists featured were simply slipped into the “festival cycle,” wherein they rotate through various festivals across the continent instead of traditionally touring. It’s great that so many festivals offer a variety of rock, hip-hop, and electronic acts to draw in the most diverse crowds, but it’s not ideal that they have started to offer so many of the same ones.

Many major fests also seem to be created from the exact same template, which makes them seem more generic. Many aim to turn the entire festival weekend into a real immersive experience for fans, often incorporating other mediums of art (comedy, video, art installations, galleries, etc.), providing a wide variety of exorbitantly priced food options for attendees, and partnering with culturally relevant brands for free festival gear, games, and drinks. These experiences are also paired with a higher price point and topped off with the notion that the more you can pay, the more access to these things you’ll get. This hyper-commercialization creates what appears to be a very distinct dividing line among those attending. It separates the audience into those who can afford the luxury and those who cannot. As a result, it can often feel rather obvious that the festival and its partners really just want your money, which can divert attention from the actual music aspect of the festival. The financial opportunities have enticed many into the market in recent years and some have even made this exclusive, luxury festival experience the primary selling point, which has not only shut out a significant chunk of the festival-going market (i.e. the aforementioned millennials that drive sales and often can’t dish out thousands of dollars for one weekend), but has also typically not succeeded (see also: Fyre Festival, which was meant to be held a remote island in the Bahamas in 2017).

It seems as if these “promoters are simply

copying and pasting the same festival formats across the country for the simplicity.

”

ivals Photo by Kyle Bianchi (Graphic Design)

So, what’s going on here? Well, when most of these major festivals are organized and helped by the same major promoters like Superfly, Another Planet, and Goldenvoice, it’s no wonder there’s so much overlap. It seems as if these promoters are simply copying and pasting the same festival formats across the country for the simplicity.

The festival cycle benefits the artists too, since smaller acts will typically get higher guarantees than their normal rate on tour as well as exposure to new audiences. While that might be fine for some, such homogeneity discourages concertgoers from traveling out to destination festivals. After all, why spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to travel to one festival when another that’s closer to your home city offers a substantially similar lineup? The effects of this decline in festival attendance and ticket sales due to such oversaturation are already evident in recent Bonnaroo attendance figures – which dropped in 2016 and 2017 from their long-standing highs of 75,000 – and the cancellation (and even bankruptcy) of festivals like FYF and Pemberton.

So what does this mean for festivals? If something doesn’t change soon, it’s likely that other big festivals may soon face similar fates as the bubble continues to burst. Is there a solution? Maybe.

Although many festivals seem to be struggling to stand apart in a

market that’s growing but also becoming more homogenous, it seems like an appropriate time for major festivals to refocus on what makes them unique. If festival organizers can shift their focus to spending more on acts that are unique to each festival rather than collecting the most top-tier popular names, creating more surprises and better memorable moments for fans, or simply cutting back the length of the fest, then there may be hope yet. Ideally, in the next few years, we’ll start to see some diversity as festival organizers realize that this model is not sustainable. The real question is just how many more festivals will have to suffer before this happens?

• Taylor Piepenbrink (Music Industry)

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death grips death grips death grips death grips death grips death grips death grips

i in pr in print in print in print in print is in print

Designer: Brooke Dunahugh (Studio Art)

Etcetera

“Whatever I want F**k who’s watching”

about sums up Death Grips’ attitude towards everything. The trio of drummer and producer Zach Hill, vocalist Stefan Burnett a.k.a. MC Ride, and producer/engineer Andy Morin a.k.a. Flatlander have taken the Internet age by storm to become the most important underground act of the 2010s. Cited by legends like David Bowie and Björk as a major influence and receiving constant and universal critical acclaim, no one pushes the boundaries of popular music quite like Death Grips. The group’s style lies somewhere between the digital hardcore of Atari Teenage Riot and the relentless punk of Black Flag and Bad Brains with a dash of Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s off-the-wall hip-hop, but it’s impossible to pin down. That’s the beauty of Death Grips, though: there is absolutely no telling what they will do next.

• Grant Foskett (Computer Science)

death grips / Exmilitary The Death Grips story begins in early 2011 with the release of their self-titled EP and the iconic video for “Full Moon (Death Classic).” It received plenty of attention due to Zach Hill’s previous band Hella having quite the underground presence. However, it was not until they followed up a month later with the mixtape Exmilitary that they would take the world of underground hip-hop by storm with a new brand of aggressive lyricism and wild production.

From opening the album with a sample of Charles Manson in “Beware” to the prominent Pink Floyd samples on “I Want It I Need It (Death Heated),” Death Grips immediately inserted themselves into the echelon of bands that demand attention and respect. Still considered among fans to be some of Death Grips’ best work, Exmilitary is undoubtedly important, but only a microcosm in their vast and varied discography.

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The Money Store

in print rint t

After the underground success of Exmilitary, Death Grips signed to Epic Records and took the next year to work on their debut album, The Money Store. Expectations were high for the band, as their relative silence until signing to a major label fueled desire for a follow-up. The album was released in 2012 to overwhelming praise, receiving an 8.7 and Best New Music from Pitchfork along with a perfect 10 from critic Anthony Fantano (TheNeedleDrop). The reality of the acclaim was that Death Grips were pushing the boundaries of hip-hop to never-before seen extremes. The Money Store is unrelentingly graphic and aggressive, depicting the paranoid, drugged-out dregs of society as unremorseful murders on a never-ending downward spiral.

When MC Ride screams out the visceral hook “Kill it like you hate it” over screeching, hypnotic synthesizers on “The Cage,” it’s hard to believe you’re listening to anything less than a maniac.

The Money Store is completely intentional in its mania though, as every track falls into place as a commentary on humanity’s lowest lows: “How low can you go? How dirty can you get?” comes the question on “Bitch Please.” Death Grips’ cryptic, aggressive lyricism and mindbending, forward-thinking production on The Money Store set the stage for the band’s future and inspired a new wave of experimental hip-hop.

No Love Deep Web Following The Money Store, Death Grips seemed to do just about everything in their power to sabotage their career. After cancelling their entire summer tour without telling anyone, the band proceeded to leak No Love Deep Web weeks early with a now infamously unmarketable cover: a low-quality photo of Zach Hill’s penis with the album title scrawled across it. No Love Deep Web diverges from the sample-heavy cacophony of The Money Store in favor of brooding, almost minimalist electronic beats. Lyrically, it also takes a turn away from the brutal violence of The Money Store and focuses on a more abstract depiction of the Internet as a depressive wasteland fueled by humanity’s greed and lust: “Bass Rattle Stars Out The Sky” deals with a dissociation from reality fueled by the Internet and “Artificial Death In The West” explains Hollywood as a manifestation of the evils of western culture.

Government Plates After the controversy of No Love Deep Web and even more cancelled shows, Death Grips surprise-released Government Plates as a free download on their website. The album is regarded by many as the band’s weakest work due to the loop-centric nature of many tracks and the subdued presence of MC Ride, but it is certainly an important point in the evolution of Death Grips’ sound. The electronic experimentation heavily foreshadows the upcoming Fashion Week and the chopped vocals show off what would be the centerpiece of N****s on the Moon.

Government Plates also demonstrated Death Grips’ willingness to move far, far away from traditional hip-hop. While their previous records are still recognizable as rap albums, production takes the front seat to lyrics on Government Plates.

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N****s on the Moon N****s on the Moon was released in 2014 as the first part of the upcoming double album The Powers That B. Featuring sampled vocals from Icelandic singer Björk on every track, the album is by far Death Grips’ most difficult and abrasive release. Many find the songwriting particularly counterintuitive, as many tracks feature several refrains and lack a clear hook.

The production also lacks the bombast of other releases, opting instead for the stuttering, hallucinatory vocal samples over a bed of jittering electronics.

Shortly after the release of N****s on the Moon, Death Grips abruptly announced they were disbanding and cancelled their upcoming tour with Nine Inch Nails and Soundgarden.

They posted a picture to Facebook of their statement scrawled on a napkin: “We are now at our best and so Death Grips is over.” Many fans speculated that the group would not really be breaking up, but given Death Grips’ chaotic nature, it was not beyond the realm of possibility.

Etcetera

Fashion Week / Jenny Death Released out of nowhere in January 2015, Fashion Week was the first Death Grips release after announcing their supposed disbandment, and also the first not to feature MC Ride. As a completely instrumental album, Fashion Week serves more as a teaser for the second half of The Powers That B than as its own project. The titles of the tracks follow a pattern, starting with “Runway J,” “Runway E,” and so on, spelling out “JENNY DEATH WHEN.” This references a phrase fans posted all over the Internet in demand of the second disk that would be released just three months later.

Jenny Death was the long awaited follow up to 2014’s N****s on the Moon and the second half of the double album The Powers That B. The album is a tumultuous and unapologetically brutal fan-favorite, intensely misanthropic and nihilistic, constantly rejecting the authority of The Powers That B. Despite this, the lyrics lack the overt violence of earlier projects. On “Centuries of Damn,” MC Ride describes a debilitating drug-addiction serving only to numb his depression, and disparages society for its vanity and perfunctory facade of compassion: “I hate you so much / I hate your laws / I hate your need a cause / I hate your faux touch / I hate every last one of you.” This is followed by what many consider to be the best Death Grips song, “On GP.” Perhaps the closest thing to a rock song the band has ever produced, “On GP” is MC Ride’s contemplation of suicide, concluding that life and death mean nothing; he only stays alive for the sake of those around him. It is a deeply personal song, blurring the line between the character of MC Ride and the person that is Stefan Burnett for the first and only time.

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Interview 2016 / Bottomless Pit Another release without MC Ride, Interview 2016 was created as a soundtrack to an interview, completely replacing all of the audio. Death Grips are known to be incredibly private, refusing almost every interview offer since their inception. This has led many to believe that Interview 2016 is a direct critique of fans getting too deep into the band’s lives. Although it might not be the most interesting project musically, Interview 2016 speaks directly to the subject matter that Death Grips deal with on the upcoming Bottomless Pit.

Bottomless Pit returns to the sounds and songwriting of The Money Store, but instead of the brutal subject matter, MC Ride’s lyrics are constantly self-referential to the band’s fame and relationship with their fans. This is paralleled to the case of the Manson Family by titling the album after Manson’s Death Valley hideout. Death Grips certainly has created a cult of personality, and the way in which they approach it on Bottomless Pit, with self-deprecation and direct criticism, is utterly unique. Bottomless Pit stands as the most refined of all Death Grips albums: the instrumentals perfectly balance abrasive, noisy production with catchy, hook-driven songwriting.

Steroids (Crouching Tiger Hidden Gabber Megamix) / Year of the Snitch Another surprise EP, Steroids was uploaded to Youtube in May 2017. It features incredibly fast paced electronic beats inspired by Gabber music and some of the noisiest soundscapes Death Grips have ever produced. It also follows a very unconventional song structure, smashing eight disjointed sections together with little in the way of transition. At times, Steroids feels unfinished but never uninteresting, and only serves to further prove that Death Grips can venture into any genre they desire.

Many fans thought that Steroids would be a teaser for the following Death Grips album, like Interview 2016 had been for Bottomless Pit, but Year of the Snitch again defied all expectations to be their absolute oddest release thus far. The band teased the album with collaborations from Tool bassist Justin Chancellor and Shrek director Andrew Adamson and the first track, just as with Jenny Death, references a meme created by fans and embraced by the band themselves to describe Death Grips’ sporadic social media presence, “Death Grips Is Online.”

With the most diverse instrumentation of any of the group’s album, Year of the Snitch sits as perhaps the most divisive album critically. “Linda’s In Custody” is yet another reference to Manson, this time to key witness in his prosecution, Linda Kasabian. The title of the album is also likely a reference to Linda, as even the album’s release date was set to coincide with her 69th birthday. The fascination with Manson is one of the only constants in Death Grips’ music, and looking forward, other than being loud and explicit, it’s one of the only things to expect in any future releases.

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JUST A TAST E O F

trash girl

Etcetera

Where are you from?

Where can people find your music?

I’m from Syracuse, New York originally and now I’m

You can find me on Bandcamp at

finishing up school at Northeastern.

https://trashgirl.bandcamp.com/

How would you describe your sound?

If you could collaborate with anyone,

I’d say it’s nostalgic and gentle. I grew up with a lot of folk

who would you choose?

music and hymns, and I think it can be reminiscent of that

I’d say Joni Mitchell, mostly because I’ve

sometimes.

grown up with her work and I think it’s

What other musicians are you into at the moment?

I’m going through another Joni Mitchell phase, especially Court and Spark, as well as Tennis, Mitksi, Paul Simon, and ABBA.

shaped the way I think musically in a lot of different ways. I think it’d be really amazing to see her process for writing and creating and performing in action.

What’s your favorite live performance you’ve been a part of?

There was this really great show I played with Community College, Tuxis Giant, and Friendship that I loved. It’s so special when you get to play with people that aren’t only talented and passionate, but also are also going after a similar vibe musically.

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trash girl

LOCAL PHOTO Matt and Kim, House of Blues

Photo by Brian Bae (Industrial Engineering)

SPOTIFY PLAYLIST We’ve compiled all the songs from page 28’s You Better Work that Purse First: The Importance of Drag Music and added a few more of our own for a kickass drag music playlist. find the playlist at: sptfy.com/K10

1. “SuperModel” — RuPaul 2. “Native Love” — Divine 3. “Din Da Da” — Kevin Aviance 4. “Your Makeup Is Terrible”— Alaska Thunderfuck 5. “Come to Brazil” — Alaska Thunderfuck 6. “Whole 9 Yards” — Adore Delano

FIND BEY

7. “Party” — Adore Delano 8. “Hollywouldn’t” — Sharon Needles 9. “Mama Don’t Make Me Put on the Dress Again” — Trixie Mattel 10. “The Same Parts” — Tatiana 11. “Brujeria” — Aja 12. “Call Me Mother” — RuPaul

FOLLOW US We’ve hidden Beyonce somewhere in this issue. Find her and maybe something cool will happen...

Like what you read? Check us out online. tastemakersmag.com @tastemakersmag 

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