Navy Blue wraps up his strong run with the 3rd installment of his soul-healing trilogy. Will definitely need to come back to the trilogy and thoroughly read through each album. But from the few listens I've done, it has some of Navy Blue's best work yet.

Peggy's most divisive album yet,

EXPERIMENTAL RAP. As someone with 30k+ plays for peggy, this is a very weird album. There's many moments of abrasive and hard deconstructed club bangers, scratching that industrial hip-hop style (not dubstep) but his sampling is not as strong as it was on previous efforts. The bar is pretty high when your previous albums are ones like LP! & SCARING THE HOES. Another thing is his performance is quite not up to par on a lot of this album. The usual ... read more

Mostly rating the 'new' tracks
But I will add as a note,
The newer mixes on some of these are so much worse than the original. The watered down 'clean' style ain't it, especially for the context of this album. Same thing tragically happened to 'What the hip-hop hell is this' when it officially released on the ILDMLFY Directors cut. He gotta stop doing these watered down mixes. (Some tweaks were also made to the original when I went back to listen which was ... read more

Mastery of poetry, consciously crafted into a complex, mind-tripping, dystopian, cerebral odyssey

WE BUY DIABETIC TEST STIPS aka, WBDTS. Armand Hammer's 6th studio album, this continues the duo's streak as being one of the best duos in hip-hop. Coming off 2021's 'Haram', billy woods & ELUCID have already proved upon the release of that album, they are entering legend status. Even if we don't count billy woods' solo albums (which is quietly becoming one of ... read more

Pharrell was possessed by something, his best production he's done yet (no disrespect to the Neptunes & NERD era)

Chaotic, pummeling, yet beautiful and melodic,

MAHŌGAKKŌ. This is the third album from Hakushi Hasegawa, and it's the most EXPLOSIVE one yet. Their debut 'Air Ni Ni' was a much cleaner approach to their chaotic style of art-pop/glitch-pop with some nu jazz as well. Much of the Japanese underground at the time was filled with this new wave of 'breakcore' and even today it's still there but much more prominent than before. While some of Hakushi's albums can ... read more

Conway's most emotionally dense & introspective opus,

GOD DON'T MAKE MISTAKES. Conway the Machine of Griselda fame, a NY collective with some of the best underground talent in the hip-hop scene. In this collective came many fantastic albums, and Conway is generally known as one of the more skilled in the collective. So it's no mystery that Conway in his bag is a top 5 pen currently. When a collective like Griselda brings so much talent to the table it's quite hard to ... read more

On Spotth, hush, and Neo's soul this is AOTY.

The terrifying, immensely cathartic, yet beautifully transcendent outpour of artistry,

SINNER GET READY. This is Lingua Ignota's third studio album, and what she manages to accomplish here is stunning. SINNER GET READY is the flower of all blooming albums in Ignota's discography. It's the album that fully realizes the past 2 works, but transforms them and brings this new formation on a whole new level of cohesiveness. Like I mentioned before in the short 'CALIGULA' ... read more

Incredibly dark & unsettling, one of the most ruthless and terrifying albums to release this year,

THE LAMB AS EFFIGY. This year has brought some really disturbing corners for music, from the absolutely insane 'Dogsbody', and the unsettling discography 'closer' from Swans (The Beggar), to now this album. The Lamb as Effigy aka TLAE might take the title from 'Dogsbody' as one of the most unsettling and manic albums of the year. This is Sprain's 2nd album ... read more

The best pop album of the decade & Magbay's magnum opus,

IMAGINAL DISK. Coming off the duo’s debut album ‘Mercurial World’, a lot of anticipation was built for their next album with how great the debut is. Magbay has been working as a duo for a decent amount of time, even going back further to when they were in a prog band. But as the new duo ‘Magdalena Bay’ they’ve put out some of the most impressive, forward thinking, and captivating pop music of ... read more

Mach delivers yet again,

#RICHAXXHAITIAN. Mach-Hommy. Arguably one of the greatest hip-hop writers and performers alive right now alongside names like Black Thought, billy woods, Aesop, Conway, etc. This is a special Mach album, being his first solo release since the 'Pray For Haiti' in 2021. In between that album and this new one he's been active dropping some solid collaboration projects and appearing on some fantastic features. But finally it's time to take apart and ... read more

A statement album of the 2020s, offering chaotically textured yet catchy and abrasive club bangers that push the boundaries of artistry,

KICK III. I'll be shortening the name of this album in this mini-review to K3, but anyway, let's talk about this mind-bending and chaotic album. Arca, a familiar name to some, is most commonly known for the collaboration work that was done on YEEZUS. Arca is a one of a kind producer & artist, and slowly over time Arca has been able to build upon ... read more

Sampha's ethereal and hypnotic follow-up, filled with elite musicianship and overwhelming passion in every corner,

LAHAI. After 5 years, Sampha finally drops his sophomore album, following up 'Process' in 2017. Now, when Process dropped, it propelled Sampha to be one of the most respected artists out, from new fans to just casual listeners who were able to catch him on some features too. Sampha's debut really displayed how serious and capable Sampha is as an artist. ... read more

The beautiful and cathartic collaboration between two generations of musical genius'

PROMISES. This is an experience you don't want to miss out on. Floating Points, a progressive-electronic artist, a genius in his craft is here to collaborate with the legendary Pharoah Sanders. Pharoah Sanders is the legendary spiritual-jazz man, and the two minds coming together for this music piece here is a moment in music to witness. To top it all off, we have the fantastic London Symphony ... read more

The haunting and otherworldly experience, it's spiritual ascension captured in music form,

THE GLOWING MAN. This is the end of Swans' mind-shattering trilogy. Up to this point we've experienced the cold and dark beginning of the trilogy from 'The Seer', and the absolutely insane, mind-crushing experience 'To Be Kind' offered. Right off the bat I will say, The Glowing Man does not quite reach the perfection that To Be Kind brought to the trilogy, However, it ... read more

The sound of the universe beginning and collapsing,

TO BE KIND. This is one of those historical moments in music, where an album is created that not only transcends genres but music itself. To Be Kind is also a special moment that not only transcends time but it also transcends human perception and emotion. To take on such a behemoth birth of art is almost insulting belittling it with human emotion and words of explanation. It's something that goes so far beyond describable words, it ... read more

The cold and dark beginning of the greatest trilogy in music history,

THE SEER. This is the beginning of one of, if not the greatest, trilogies in music in history. Swans is a Post-Rock/Experimental Rock band that is not afraid to break boundaries and create behemoth-sized pieces of art. Up to this point, Swans has already built upon a legendary discography. What we didn't know was that Swans was about to deliver 3 albums that transcend human perception and thoughts. The Swans trilogy is ... read more

The absolute pinnacle of British engineering,

Track 1 - HELLFIRE
The opener of this album serves to introduce many main themes of the albums, with the narration and description of many cryptic topics which will be later explored in the many dense stories and writing this album offers. The instrumentation on this track almost plays like a theme, going over a spectrum of sounds and musical themes in a very theatrical way. This is black midi's most theatrical album, and with the way each ... read more

Swans is the greatest band of all-time,

BIRTHING. Swans' 17th album, which is a very special one that holds great significance in their discography. Why? This was announced as Swans final album in their 'big sound' trilogy style. Now before this album we got 2024's 'Live Rope', which is one of Swans best live albums, by default also one of the best live albums of all-time. But before 'Live Rope' we had Swans & Gira exploring existential themes and ... read more