Fluxblog #346: Crumb | Skate Key/Iblss • Kiina • Goya Gumbani/Subculture • CLBRKS/Dweeb • Fika/Bambie
Plus two more very special Christmas playlists
Fluxpod is back this week with an episode featuring an interview with Lila Ramani and Bri Aranow from Crumb, the band who made Ice Melt, one of my top favorite albums of 2021. We talk about how they made the record before and after the pandemic hit, their process and inspirations, and why they are committed to self-releasing all of their music. You can find the episode on all the major podcast platforms as well as the Fluxblog Patreon.
I have two new holiday playlists for you this week! The first is A DUDES ROCK CHRISTMAS, a selection of hard rockin’ holiday songs that I hope live up to the spirit of the cover art, which is from a 1986 Chess King ad painted by fantasy illustration legend Boris Vallejo. This one includes tunes by AC/DC, Queen, My Chemical Romance, Ramones, Twisted Sister, Sonic Youth, Korn, and many more. [Spotify | Apple]
The second playlist is BOPPIN’ AROUND THE CHRISTMAS TREE, a collection of Christmas songs recorded by some of the biggest pop stars of the past 30 years including Lady Gaga, Destiny’s Child, Taylor Swift, TLC, Kylie Minogue, Madonna, Amy Winehouse, and of course, Mariah Carey. [Spotify | Apple]
A Black Hole Bloomed In My Living Room
Skate Key and Iblss “Rootwork”
The lyrics of “Rootwork” fixate on geography and death, and both overlapping in catastrophes and aftermaths. Skate Key senses ghosts all around him – relatives whose absence reshapes the family dynamic, communities built on the legacies of the long gone, traumas that get passed down from people he could never know. It’s a morbid song but there’s a touch of serenity in Skate Key’s soft rasp, and grace in the way he bows out of the song to let Iblss’ gentle woodwind loop run out for a few measures at the end.
Go to Iblss on Bandcamp.
Kiina “Recall”
“Recall” evokes a vaseline-on-the-lens melodrama in the way it bends and blurs what sounds like a vocal pulled from a mid-20th century ballad – not sure what, probably shouldn’t narc on it either way. It feels both melancholy and placid, particularly as the beat settles in and the music drifts out into jazzy keyboard noodling. It’s more of an interstitial than a full song, but it conveys a lot of feeling in just over a minute.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
Similar To Satan
Goya Gumbani & Subculture featuring Pearl de Luna “Valley of Def”
Subculture’s track for “Valley of Def” sounds like a descent into a seedy, sexy underworld with a heavy ambiance that’s equal parts jazzy noir and stoned paranoia. Pearl de Luna’s vocals are purred and slurred in a way that reminds me of Martina Topley-Bird on the early Tricky records, while Goya Gumbani’s verses are rapped with a cautious sort of calm. He doesn’t sound relaxed, but he does sound focused and thoughtful as he seems to navigate his way through terrors from both within and without.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
CLBRKS & Dweeb “Forwhatitsworth”
CLBRKS has an odd and immediately fascinating voice – a clear and obvious English accent, but with the hard nasal honk of New York rapper. In “Forwhatitsworth” he’s framed by the sort of soul samples you’d expect to hear on say, a Ghostface or classic Kanye record, but DWEEB’s production style chops it all up very coarse and uneven. It makes even the most graceful moments feel raw and unstable, so both the music and the vocal end up sounding like a slightly uncanny version of a rap style that’s mostly quite familiar.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
I’m A Cosmic Kind Of Girl
Fika and Bambie “Coffee and Clouds”
“Coffee & Clouds” sounds calm and unbothered, like music meant for a tracking shot of someone strolling down a beautiful street on television in a very “life is good!” moment. Bambie’s lyrics complicate the mood without disrupting it – in the verses she’s dissecting her past behavior, but in the chorus she melts into affection and infatuation. There’s bits of this song that sound almost deliriously happy or blissfully content, but she never really shakes off the acute self-awareness. It basically just goes from being really in her head about being in her head, to being in her head and just loving the vibes.
Buy it from Bandcamp.
LINKS LINKS LINKS LINKS LINKS LINKS
• Rob Sheffield interviewed Carl Newman of The New Pornographers about the anniversary of Mass Romantic over at Rolling Stone.
• Larry Fitzmaurice has a whole lot of interesting thoughts about notable music from the past few years, including his ongoing fascination with Lana Del Rey’s “The Greatest,” which to me is a fairly middling one by her standards but it definitely has provocative lyrics.
• Halsey talked about how they wrote “You Asked for This,” one of the best songs on their new album, in a new episode of Song Exploder.