Cordavision Music Reviews

I find it great that in literally every picture I’ve seen Faye Webster in, she just looks different but the same…? It’s tough to explain. Let me just use this post to say that June 25th, 2021 has been one of the biggest New Music Fridays in a long time. It’s pretty nice that throughout all of this Tyler, the Creator and Doja Cat and Lucy Dacus and Hiatus Kaiyote that Faye Webster is getting a bunch of press as well. The first time I heard of Webster was her song “Kingston” from her last album, Atlanta Millionaires Club . I didn’t listen to the singles going into this album, I Know I’m Funny haha , mainly because I didn’t get to, but I’m pretty glad that I didn’t. I personally enjoy listening to these types of albums without knowing the singles from it, so let’s just get right into I Know I’m Funny haha to see what all the fuss is about. The folk/country/alternative style is a pretty niche combination, yet it tends to work on paper. Webster has rocked this sound for her past albums and

(AUTHOR'S NOTE: Not me accidentally dropping this review early.) My most popular YouTube upload is my bite-size review of Hot Pink , so who knows if this is gonna do well or not. I’ve always kinda liked Doja Cat as an artist. She’s in this R&B/pop lane that I don’t listen to that often, but whenever I’ve heard a song of her’s, it’s been alright. I don’t think she’s that much of an album artist, though. Her past two albums, Amala and Hot Pink , aren’t the best R&B/pop albums out there, but as I’ve said earlier, they’re alright. When the first single “Kiss Me More” with SZA dropped, it got me pretty excited for it, honestly. It’s one of the better singles of the year, and along with that, it’s just an earworm. Maybe that’s why I like “Physical” by Olivia Newton-John so much too, but that’s beside the point. The collaborators on Planet Her are also pretty exciting. We have the artists that she’s worked with before like Ariana Grande and The Weeknd, but we also have some new

I wrote a college paper on the concept of IGOR , and I got an A-. I think I’m pretty qualified for this. If you know me, you probably know that Tyler, the Creator is one of my favorite artists of all time. Even if his earlier work doesn’t resonate with me as much as I’d like it to, his talents go beyond what I think anyone expected from Goblin or even Wolf to an extent. Flower Boy and IGOR are some of my favorite albums of all time, and no matter what he was going to do next, I’m pretty sure that I was at least going to like it. Once the promotion started with these billboards and a phone number to call to hear an interlude from this album, CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST , I was immediately hooked. The first single that dropped, “LUMBERJACK,” was a very interesting lead-up for the album. It told me that this was gonna be a full-on rap album from him, which was something I’ve been waiting on, as much as I love IGOR . Also, I loved the DJ Drama inclusion on it, he gave the song so much ener

This guy’s getting to me, trying to name his album after my favorite album of the year so far. Alright, why am I covering this GoldLink? This got me interested. I know he’s said some pretty dumb shit about Mac Miller, but I’m not taking that into account. His 2017 mixtape At What Cost is one of the most underappreciated albums of that year, and I could say the exact same of his debut album Diaspora . Now, we have HARAM! , his second studio album and honestly, I’ve heard nothing about this. I didn’t even hear about this bizarre cover art that I’m not sure if I have to censor on Instagram when I promote this review on that platform. I have nothing to expect or anything to talk about on this, so let’s just skip the formalities and get into HARAM! and what makes this project good or bad. Also, I gotta point out this one thing before I get into the details: What is with this vocal filter he has on most of this project? He is not 2D from Gorillaz, I’ve talked with a couple people about thi

I admit, it’s pretty self-explanatory, but let me go over some ground rules. 1: These aren’t ranked in any way. These are projects I liked categorized by month. 2: I’ll be offering my small thoughts on it, along with linking the full review. 3: There are albums that I’m gonna include that never got a full review. Those will have longer paragraphs and a rating. 4: Obviously, These are all my opinions, so if an album’s missing from this list, why don’t you comment on your favorite album of the year so far? Maybe your take on it will show something I missed! 5: All of these albums were released before June 25. So, even if I wanna put it on there, the new Tyler, the Creator album isn’t on this list. Let’s get into the best projects of 2021 in my opinion (so far). January Ashnikko - DEMIDEVIL Blurb: For such a polarizing artist, Ashnikko is taking the pop-rap world by storm, and with DEMIDEVIL as her blade, she’ll cut down quite a bit of the competition. Review: https://cordavisionrecords.

For an album called Ice Daddy , there are barely any “BRRR” adlibs. :( For the majority of last year, Gucci Mane was relatively and surprisingly quiet. He spent most of 2020 revamping his label, 1017 Worldwide, and finding new proteges to take on. Two of them have appearances on this, BigDogWalk and Pooh Shiesty, who’s already had a pretty big year so far. Some publications have gone on to call the 1017 roster the Trap Avengers. I personally disagree, but I totally understand why. For his first solo album since 2019, Ice Daddy is essentially a back-to-basics album. It’s another Gucci Mane album for the masses. Is it any good? Let’s find out. Honestly, just looking at the tracklist and features, I was pretty sure this was gonna be good. Sir Mix-a-Lot, BIG30, Lil Baby, Lil Uzi Vert, 2 Chainz, Young Dolph, E-40, and Project Pat all on one project? That’s absolutely insane. These features certainly did their job, though, but they weren’t truly outstanding to me. Except for E-40’s feature,

I fully understand that the album cover’s low quality for a reason, but it just works. Bronx rapper MIKE has been an artist that’s always stood out to me. His very laidback delivery with morbid and depressive lyrics can be matched with Earl Sweatshirt’s newest output, but while some people think MIKE is taking from Earl, it’s actually the other way around. His last album, weight of the world , was one of my favorite rap albums of 2020, and a year to the day, he’s back with his seventh album overall, Disco! . I really wasn’t expecting any major switch-ups in sound or lyrics, but we only have one feature on here and that comes in the form of Sideshow, who recently made a good contribution to The Alchemist’s latest EP, This Thing of Ours . Once again, it’s entirely produced by MIKE under the dj blackpower moniker, and that pretty much sums up my expectations. Is Disco! another record under MIKE’s belt? Let’s see. When it comes to the production, it’s a lot more abstract and his least acc

I was so tempted to put this review out on Friday, but that’d be too easy. Ah, yes. 2011. The Harry Potter film franchise concluded, Adele was everywhere, and we lost Amy Winehouse and Nate Dogg. Oh, and a little group called Death Grips formed. A decade can be a very long time for anything to evolve, whether it comes to films or especially music. One of the most infectious songs of the early 2010s, for better or for worse, was Rebecca Black’s “Friday.” Now that’s stuck in your head, so I’ll try and get through it. There’s a reason why that song is so hated, mainly because it has the fundamental workings of a ‘perfect’ pop song. I know that’s a hot take, shut up, but either way, it seems like it had a pretty negative impact on Black’s personal life as she went mostly quiet when it came to her music. As a result of that, the music she did make really didn't hit that level of popularity. Then, all of a sudden, when I was sitting down to listen to/review Dorian Electra’s newest album

At least the art’s pretty cool, I like all the colors. Well, uh, I believe this is the first new soundtrack I’ve reviewed, and I’ll keep it straightforward here. F9 is the newest film in the Fast and Furious franchise, and each film in the series has a soundtrack like this. I’m not overly excited about this, or most movie soundtracks in this vein in general, but I always tend to look at it as some fun collaborations that may or may not happen outside of it. This time around, we got some decent names on here. Don Toliver, Lil Durk, Latto, Skepta, Pop Smoke, A$AP Rocky, Juicy J, Project Pat, Offset, Trippie Redd, Kevin Gates, King Von, Ty Dolla Sign, Jack Harlow, 24kGoldn, Amenazzy, Farruko, Myke Towers, Rochy RD, Liam H, René LaVice Re-Amp, The Prodigy, RZA, Justin Quiles, Dalex, Konshens, Lil Tecca, Anitta, Polo G, Teejay3k, Good Gas, JP the Wavy, NLE Choppa, Rico Nasty, Jarina De Marco, Murci, Sean Paul, and Dixson Waz are all here. Is anything from the F9 soundtrack worth listenin

I mean, I can’t wait for this to sweep the Grammys next year. H.E.R. is an artist that I’ve always been championing casually. She’s a genuinely talented artist that seemingly came out of nowhere. The first song I heard of hers was “Best Part” with Daniel Caesar, where I had actually heard him first too. She reminded me quite a bit of Alicia Keys in the best way possible, and on top that, she is a fucking incredible guitarist. When her full-length debut, Back of My Mind , was officially announced, I was really excited for it. As the details came out about it, though, the music nerd that you usually see write on this site was a little concerned. This thing is 21 tracks, and while it is an R&B album and a little easier to digest, it’s still very long. The features, while there are a few interesting ones here, I would’ve loved to see at least one female collab on here. Ty Dolla $ign, Cordae, Lil Baby, Thundercat, Chris Brown, Yung Bleu, Bryson Tiller, and YG is a pretty stacked list, b

Stevie Nicks didn’t deserve this… Don’t light the torches just yet. At their start, Maroon 5 was a pretty good band. Songs About Jane and It Won't Be Soon Before Long has some of my favorite pop-rock songs of all time, and I hold those two albums in high esteem. Everybody knew that they were declining after those albums, but nearly all of those albums have had at least a couple hits. “Misery,” “Moves Like Jagger,” “Payphone,” “Daylight,” “Sugar,” “Maps,” etc. When their last album, Red Pill Blues , hit the shelves, though, something changed. There really wasn’t a massive hit from this album, outside of a Cardi B remix that appeared on a deluxe reissue the next year. Was their relevance waning? I got a soft spot for them, and even though their music has declined, it sucks to see a band I held in high regard when I was younger stumble later in life. That’s why it was so surprising to see damn near no promotion for their newest album, JORDI , named after their late manager. What exa

Honestly, I’m so glad I finally have an excuse to talk about this guy now. The concept of time is a very heavy topic to tackle in every form of medium. It’s not often we get a concept album about time, especially in hip-hop, so I might as well get into that. Your Old Droog is a rapper that caught my eye earlier this year with Tha Wolf on Wall St. , his joint project with Tha God Fahim. It was a pretty good jazz-rap project that was a bit of a left turn from Droog’s usual sound, and it was a bit of fresh air. I just didn’t expect him to follow it up so early with TIME , his seventh studio album. There are also some pretty heavy-hitting guests here like Aesop Rock, Elzhi, Blu, Mick Jenkins, Wiki, and the late MF DOOM. How does this hold up? Let’s take a trip through TIME to see. Let me just say that the first five tracks are the perfect set-up for this project. After a little intro, we have “The Magic Watch,” which is about an eccentric inventor who holds the key to time travel through

I may be wrong, but I think they like butterflies. For being around for a little under a decade, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard are pretty prolific. Since their inception, they’ve put out seventeen albums. That’s a very big album, and admittedly, there’s not a bad one among them. That’s very impressive, and quite frankly, I always take a look whenever they drop. Speaking of, they dropped an album earlier this year called L.W. , and it was kind of forgettable. It was cool, but since it was a sister piece to last year’s K.G. , it didn’t feel like a new trek into a new sound, which is what they’re usually known for. Now, for this next album here, Butterfly 3000 , they’re back to their old habits by not having a habit at all. This time around, they boldly go to a new sound: psychedelic pop. Interestingly enough, leading up to this, there was no tracklist, cover, or single for it, so we’re going in blind on this one. So, let’s not waste any more time and get into Butterfly 3000 . Damn,

This is a good weekend for bad album covers. I cannot say this enough, but Polo G has somehow become a massive star. Not to say that he’s talentless, he actually has quite a bit of talent, but it seemed like he became a star overnight. The first time I genuinely heard one of his songs was his contribution to the Judas and the Black Messiah soundtrack earlier this year, and I had two takeaways. One: I could see why he’s liked so much. Two: I definitely understood why he gained the nickname Piano G. Last month, I actually checked out his two past projects, Die a Legend and The GOAT , and just based on that, what’s his next album gonna be called? He Rested on the Seventh Day ? Jokes aside, his first two projects before this new one, Hall of Fame , are actually pretty alright. What compelled me about it was his storytelling. For such a new name on the scene, he has pretty great lyrics. Does this continue to his newest album? Let’s get into Hall of Fame and find out. Now, let me just say

No matter what how I feel about this album, I’ll stand by this statement: This cover art is atrocious. Contrary to popular belief, I’ve actually really missed Migos for these past few years. When they officially got on my radar with 2017’s Culture , it felt like a breath of fresh air that trap really needed. It was essentially an ‘all killer, no filler’ attitude that hasn’t really been shown in trap yet, and honestly, hasn’t been shown in that capacity and done this well since then. It’s one of my favorite trap albums ever, and they just had to fuck it up a year later with Culture II , and god this was bad. It felt like a mixtape that definitely shouldn’t have been Culture II . Now, three years later, Quavo, Offset, and Takeoff are back with Culture III , and even if it isn’t that ‘all killer, no filler’ output this time, I’m still excited for them taking time to see if this could replicate at least half of that quality met, which wasn’t met on II . Okay, we’ve heard enough. Let’s get

Horrorcore is making a massive comeback, and I will be a full supporter of it. I’ve spoken about Zambian-Canadian rapper Ashanti Mutinta, better known as Backxwash, on here once, but her impact has already been felt not just through my music taste but through a major award. Honestly, she caught my attention when she said that Nine Inch Nails’ “Reptile” has a hip-hop influence, but that’s neither here nor there. Her breakout album, God Has Nothing to Do with This Leave Him Out of It , won her 2020’s Polaris Prize. I spoke about that already in my review of that album, but it’s worth mentioning here. With winning that award, her profile only grew. This was shown during the lead up to the release of this album, the highly-anticipated I LIE HERE BURIED WITH MY RINGS AND MY DRESSES . She started off naming her collaborators for this album: Ada Rook (who also mastered the entire album), noise producer Lauren Bosfield, Speedy Ortiz vocalist/poet Sadie Dupuis, Code Orange members Eric ‘Shade’

Something feels… off. Alright, there’s gonna have to be a disclaimer with this one: I haven’t seen Inside . Oddly enough, I might be one of the only people in my age range that doesn’t have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Roku, or whatever fits under that category. Except for Disney+, we MCU fans have been eating recently. Why do I say this? Well, again in my age range, Bo Burnham is a bit of an icon. He started on YouTube and jumped to stand-up comedy, where he only grew. After a bout with anxiety, he disappeared from live performances for a while. In that time, he wrote and directed a fantastic movie called Eighth Grade , directed Chris Rock’s most recent stand-up special, and starred in a critically acclaimed movie, Promising Young Woman . Now, he returns to what made him a superstar with Inside , a Netflix special that was created entirely by Burnham during the beginning of the pandemic. Everything was done by him: writing, direction, lighting, cinematography, editing, etc. All of it.

Seeing this group get so much praise for this album is insane, I’m so happy for them. Not a lot of people know this about me, but there was a time when Wolf Alice was my favorite band. Their first two albums, My Love is Cool and Visions of a Life , are so incredibly underrated and underappreciated in the modern alt-rock canon. Since then, though, I grew out of the alt-rock phase and listened to other music. Once I finally heard that Wolf Alice was coming back with Blue Weekend , I was ecstatic. The lead single, “The Last Man on Earth,” really set the stage for something special. I don’t talk about alt-rock too often, so I might as well use the comeback of one of my favorite groups as an excuse to do so. Let’s get into the comeback of Wolf Alice, Blue Weekend . If I could critique the group for one thing, it’d be that they really didn’t have a true identity. Yes, My Love is Cool and Visions of a Life are great, but they didn’t have anything that made them stand out in this alt-rock l

Everything about this makes me genuinely uncomfortable in the best ways possible. I like creepy music. Like, something that genuinely gets your skin to crawl. Chinese-German artist Pan Daijing has been working in that lane since 2015, and it’s quite frankly some of the most skin-crawling stuff I’ve heard in a while. Four years after her harrowing album Lack 惊蛰 , she’s back with some new creepy shit, Jade 玉观音 . To enhance the experience, I ended up listening to this at 1 am so I could get the whole experience of whatever the hell this was gonna be. Let’s get into Jade 玉观音 and see how it went. I’m gonna start off with a quote from Daijing herself that I think describes this album quite well: ‘Solitude is like an immense lake you’re swimming through… Sometimes you dip your head in and sometimes you lift it up.’ Jade 玉观音 is one of the most terrifying experiences I’ve had listening to music in a while mainly because I was alone while doing so. A highlight on this was on “Dictee 三月,” where

What does a person have for breakfast in Japan? Toast? This is gonna be a weird review for me. This is one of those reviews where I know nothing about the artist outside of their name. Michelle Zauner, better known as Japanese Breakfast, seems to be a pretty accomplished producer along with being a singer-songwriter. Outside of a few credits, the production on Jubilee is done entirely by Zauner herself. I’ve only heard one single from this, “Posing in Bondage,” and it’s quite fantastic. It left a very good first impression on this album, so let’s not waste any more time. Let’s get into Jubilee . Zauner is a pretty amazing vocalist. I loved pretty much every song when it came to the vocals on the album. The production on here is also so fucking gorgeous, especially in the standout track “Kokomo, IN.” I’d also love to highlight “Posing for Cars,” which has this genuinely stunning guitar solo which is *chef’s kiss* BEAUTIFUL. Also, I love the whole ‘quality over quantity’ aspects of this

Part of me was really hoping that this would just be Lil Baby on drill beats, he’d sound fantastic in that lane to me. I’ve always been a little lukewarm on both of these rappers. They make music that I personally don’t go to that often whenever I just want to listen to music. However, Lil Baby has been steadily increasing in quality ever since his features on Drake’s “Wants and Needs” and J. Cole’s “Pride is the Devil,” which were some of the best features of the year so far. Lil Durk has also been on a bit of a hot streak, even if I haven’t personally enjoyed or have come back to his projects from last year. Their past collaborations have been good to me, but now they have a whole project together, The Voice of the Heroes . How’d it turn out? Let’s see. Well, let me start off with this: There’s a reason why Lil Baby is billed first. He doesn’t blow me away or anything like he has on his features this year or even on My Turn , but he is definitely the better performer on this album. T

If CD Projekt Red weren’t so safe, they would’ve made something like this the box art for Cyberpunk 2077 and I would’ve loved it. You thought dubstep was a dormant genre? Well, guess what? I’m here to bring it back into the spotlight. Or streetlight, my audience isn’t THAT big yet. Either way, I actually had this recommended to me by a friend of mine who’s really in the EDM/dubstep scene. After doing some research, MUST DIE! has actually been a pretty big force in the late stages of dubstep as a genre, working with the likes of Flux Pavilion, Zomboy, and even Skrillex. He’s been cementing himself as a pretty big figure not only in dubstep but in electronic music as a whole. His second studio album, CRISIS VISION , would’ve usually left no impression as I went onto the next project, but there was something about this that I just had to speak about. Collaborators on here include Akeos, Skream, IMANU, The Pom-Poms, Link, and onumi (I actually know who this is, and her stuff is fucking gre

CLASSIC ALBUM #1: THE FIRST IN A NEW SERIES THAT I WILL OCCASIONALLY ADD TO. THESE ALBUMS ARE NOT RANKED OR SCORED BECAUSE THEY’RE, WELL, CLASSIC. The other day, I watched Miles Ahead , a biopic on legendary jazz performer Miles Davis. That really didn’t influence my review, I’m just saying that Don Cheadle plays a great Davis and should be much more appreciated in the acting world outside of being Rhodey. As stated above, I’m starting a little classic album review series. It’s something that can get me writing about other albums I like and listen to outside of the new releases that I pretty much only cover outside of a few exceptions. I figured I should start off with something for the masses, something that people could say ‘Oh, yeah. That album IS a classic’ before I get into the more opinionated reviews. So, let’s get into Miles Davis’ 1959 masterpiece Kind of Blue . I know, I know. It’s pretty cliche to put this album on a classic album list or a greatest albums of all time list,

Dude, I’m so drained today. What’ll help me? I’m not a Drainer. I’ve tried in the past to like the music of artists like Bladee, ECCO2K, and Yung Lean, but it never clicked for me. It almost felt like it was an inside joke that I didn’t get. I’ve heard multiple projects from this camp, but honestly, I haven’t genuinely loved anything outside of ECCO2K’s PXE . The Drain Gang ringleader Bladee’s last project with Mechatok, Good Luck , was pretty nondescript to me but was mainly considered a disappointment by his hardcore fans. Now, Bladee has surprise-dropped a new project here titled The Fool , and honestly, I think I finally got something to write about here. Let’s get into the mind of The Fool . The best aspect by far of this is the production. Wow, I mean, WOW. I mentioned in my bite-size review of ECCO2K’s PXE that the production sounded like a crystal exploding, and that also applies to this project here. This is legitimately some of the most mind-orienting production I’ve heard s

Something unlocked in my mind while listening to this. I’m still working on what that is, though. These days, folk music goes very underappreciated. A lot of people gravitate more towards the more iconic folk artists from the 60s and 70s like Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, and it’s pretty easy to become fans of artists like Simon and Garfunkel. Sadly, not a lot of newer folk artists are getting the love they rightfully deserve. Right off the top of my head, artists like Bon Iver, Laura Marling, and even Ichiko Aoba deserve just as much love as the Dylans and the Cohens of the world. Focusing on foreign folk (or basically foreign to me, someone who was born and raised in America), it’s vastly overlooked. The aforementioned Aoba, who has quickly become one of my favorite artists ever, has a new competitor in this field of foreign folk music: Natalia Lafourcade. The Grammy-nominated singer has put out a new installment of her Un Canto por México series, this being the second volume. I’ve h

Look, these guys are cool, but calling them the King Crimson of our time is a little much, isn’t it? If I’m being totally honest, I’ve never gotten the hype around black midi. If you don’t know, black midi is a part of this new wave of British prog-rock like Squid and Black Country, New Road. black midi’s debut album, Schlagenheim , and while I found it to be technically impressive, nothing else was that impressive. Honestly, I forgot about it until their new album, Cavalcade , was announced. That’s a bit of a hot take in the nerdy music world, but after the single “John L” from this project, my excitement grew. They were taking a more jazz-rock style and it was pretty exciting. That’s pretty much all I have to say, so let’s get into Cavalcade . Let’s get some positives out of the way first. I absolutely adored the closing track “Ascending Forth” mainly because of how ambitious it was. It’s definitely my favorite track and a surprisingly great ballad. “Diamond Stuff” was pretty cool to