Cordavision Music Reviews

I mean, if God doesn’t make mistakes, why is Suicide Squad (2016) real? Conway the Machine has been an artist that’s been continuing to impress me for the past couple of years now. At this point, it feels like this album here is a culmination of his career so far. The release of Conway’s third studio album, God Don’t Make Mistakes , is a huge stepping-off point in his career. It’s his only release for Eminem’s Shady Records, it’s his first release for his own Drumwork label, and most notably, it’s his final album before his departure from the label that started it all, Griselda Records. He’s been hyping this up for a couple years now, so after a long-ass wait, let’s get into God Don’t Make Mistakes . There’s something interesting about this album that sets it apart from most of Conway’s other projects. At times, he seems a little more vulnerable and personal in his lyrics than he typically is. It’s backed up by some of the best production on any Griselda-adjacent album yet from big na...

I know there’s no official cover art for this, but I had to put something there to complete the aesthetic. It was bothering me too much. As a Kanye West fan, I feel like it’s become very difficult to defend him as of late. Hell, the jeen-yuhs documentary airing on Netflix right now is genuinely fantastic, but still, the actions of Ye now are really affecting how I can enjoy his content now. Especially after last year’s Donda , which my view of has dimmed just a tiny bit, it’s been tough to figure out what’s been going on with him personally. I don’t think we’re gonna get that with Donda 2 , which was only released onto his $200 Stem Player ‘platform.’ Of course, stuff like that is set to leak, and here I am reviewing it. So, let’s see if we can separate the artist from the art one more time. Let me just say this right off the bat: This album is unfinished. It’s not unfinished in the way Ye’s own The Life of Pablo is, where its messiness benefits the experience. This is unfinished in ...

Based on the title alone, that man can do more than me. Throughout nearly two years of writing and reviewing music on this site, this is the first time I was actually hit up by random people on Twitter to review something. To my knowledge, Cities Aviv is a rapper and producer from Memphis. He’s been around for about a decade now, and it seems like this album here is finally going to be his breakout album. Right out of the gate, the cover art for Man Plays the Horn stands out to me. I can’t really make anything out of it, so if there’s an official description or reason said by Aviv about it, I’d love to see it. Either way, let’s get into Man Plays the Horn . Given the cover, I had a general idea about what this album could sound like. It’s an abstract rap album in the vein of MIKE and Navy Blue, but there’s something very unique about this one. The production on this is incredibly immersive and lures you in so much that it eventually becomes suffocating. It’s also taking much more insp...

There’s a lot of output for a band that’s broken up, you know. Look, I don’t need to get into Black Dresses too much. Technically, they aren’t even a band anymore. Ada Rook and Devi McCallion broke up Black Dresses in 2020 after fan harassment, and after that, they decided to not be a band but drop music together anyway under the Black Dresses name. I still really don’t know what that means, but hey, we’re getting music out of it. Last year’s Forever In Your Heart is one of my favorite experimental releases of 2021, and honestly, I expect nothing different from this one. Let’s not waste any more time and get into Forget Your Own Face . To compare it to another one of their releases, I’d say it’s most similar to one of their first projects as a group, HELL IS REAL . That’s a more abrasive project, and I’ve called each Black Dresses project I’ve reviewed loud, but I mean it when I say that this album is *loud.* There are points where it could even be categorized as a noise album. The vo...

I’m all for artistic choice, but the gold frame missing on the left side is pissing me off personally. I have a weirdly specific story of how I came to find out about Beach House. When I was a kid, I went to the library a lot to look through the CDs to see what they had. Most of the time, they had the duo’s 2013 album  depression cherry on the shelf. I’d take it around and hold it often because it had a felt packaging. To this day, it’s something about that physical release, and the album itself, that I feel is weirdly nostalgic for me. Why do I say ‘weirdly?’ Mainly because it’s the only Beach House album I’ve heard up to this point. I don’t know why I never went back and listened to their other albums, I just haven’t yet. Maybe the weird sectioned release strategy of their newest album, Once Twice Melody , should’ve done it, but that’s just me. Either way, I waited until the whole album was out to review this one, and it’s finally here. Let’s get into Once Twice Melody . I state...

I’m not even gonna bother with an NFT joke. Big K.R.I.T. is a rapper that I’ve liked a few songs of, but I really only like one of his entire projects, and that’s 4eva Is a Mighty Long Time from 2017. Quite frankly, I didn’t even know that he dropped another album in 2019 until I researched some details for this new album here. Either way, like most albums these days for me, I went into Digital Roses Don’t Die without hearing any of the singles and completely going in blind. Let’s just get into it. Right off the bat, I think the production is pretty good across the board. It’s done entirely by K.R.I.T., and it luckily fits his voice and sounds pretty well when paired with the sound. Along with that, the ‘dirty South’ sound that was all over the other albums I’ve heard from his catalog isn't really present here. K.R.I.T. goes for a more melodic angle for most of the album, and if I may be honest, he’s just okay in this lane. The whole romance concept of this album seems alright to...

Ah, I don’t think I have a quirky one-liner for this. Alice Glass deserves the fame. Crystal Castles, a duo she was in with one Ethan Kath, deserved the fame. Hell, even as CC’s music began to decline, it was Glass’s vocals that were holding up that quality to me. It was understandably shocking to find out that Kath was abusing Glass for practically their entire professional careers as Crystal Castles. Either way, after all of that, Glass laid low for a while. Then, eventually, we now have Alice Glass’s first solo album, PREY//IV . I’ve only heard one song from it, so I’m mainly going into this blind. Let’s not waste any more time and get into it. I’ll say that the album’s biggest strength is its lyrics and songwriting. Speaking about any kind of trauma in music, especially when it’s the core concept of an album, is a very brave thing to do, and Glass really has done this in spades. I think it’s the album's biggest draw and its main strength. I also think Glass’s vocals are very st...

Getting some Fantastic Mr. Fox vibes on this one. Big Thief has always interested me, but what really caught my attention was lead singer Adrianne Lenker’s solo album from last year, songs . I just loved her voice and writing style, and after listening to some of Big Thief’s work, it translated very well to the band. Ever since then, I’ve been anticipating whatever Lenker or Big Thief would do next, and we have that in the form of a new double album, Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You . It’s a mouthful, I know, but if it’s anything like the group’s other albums, we’re in for a good time. Let’s get into it. Right off the bat, I’ll say that this is a massive album. It’s 20 tracks and a little over 80 minutes long, but miraculously, I wouldn’t cut a single song from this. It’s almost like a jam session happening while you’re sitting around a warm campfire with the group, pretty much like the cover art. Like I said earlier, Lenker’s songwriting and vocals carry over from other proj...

I mean, calling one of your first big projects ‘too perfect for this world’ is pretty huge. Alright, I really don’t have an intro for this review? I think $NOT’s last album, 2020’s Beautiful Havoc , was pretty cool and I liked the direction he was going in. I always knew that his newest album, Ethereal , was set to release at some point, but what really got me interested was his hard-hitting single with A$AP Rocky, “Doja.” Either way, it got me very excited to check out Ethereal , so does it live up to the hype? Let’s see if it does. I’d say that the biggest improvement here is $NOT’s vocals, which seem much more accomplished and confident on this album. Along with that, the features here are fantastic too. The aforementioned Rocky, Kevin Abstract, Trippie Redd, and even Joey Bada$$ lend some good features to $NOT. The production here is pretty nice too, even if it’s sometimes rough around the edges. $NOT’s lyrics are alright too, but it’s mainly used to hold up a good melody. However,...

*an obvious joke* This is a case where I was simply pulled into the album because of some good cover art, you know? I don’t know that much about Yeule, but what I do know is that Yeule is from Singapore and the stage name of Yeule is based on the Final Fantasy character. That’s pretty much if for that, and as I stated earlier, I mainly wanted to listen to Glitch Princess because I just think the cover’s sick as fuck. So, let’s just get into it. Like it says in the name, the production throughout this album is very glitchy. There’s honestly no way around saying that because it’s simply true. It’s also not often that a gorgeous voice can mesh so well with that kind of production, but it somehow does beautifully. Personally, the one thing that didn’t stick out to me too well was the writing, but since I’ve heard others praise the writing so much, that could change for me at some point since I’ve been listening to this on repeat for a little bit now. Also, as a fun treat for the digital ...

Flowers are pretty cool, just saying. Let me be honest with you, I know nothing about Saba. I know he’s in a group, PivotGang, and I know that people are very excited about his return, Few Good Things . I took a listen to Care For Me , his last album from nearly four years ago, and while I know people that LOVE that project, I thought it was just okay to me. However, it did get me curious enough to check out this new album here, so let’s not waste any more time and get into Few Good Things . I’ll just say that right off the bat, this isn’t as conceptual as Care For Me . I know that there are some people that go into albums for that, but it really didn’t affect my listening experience. What I think stands out here is his heartbreaking lyrics on here. It’s refreshing to hear Saba like this because I don’t think we’ve ever heard this side of him in his music before, and it’s really compelling to me to hear it. There are a lot of features on here too, but I think most of them do a good job...

Why is everyone saying this is called Laurel Hell ? I’m definitely seeing Yanny Hell over here. Mitski has been an artist that has just been a little cool for me for a while. Yes, I adore Bury Me at Makeout Creek , Puberty 2 , and Be the Cowboy , but I’ve never really thought of Mitski as an artist I tend to go back to as often as some other artists I like. However, there seems to be a divide with this new project of hers, Laurel Hell . This is mainly coming from the sonic direction of the album, which includes more electronics and a whole lot of synthesizers. Either way, the singles from this intrigued me, so let’s not waste any more time and get into Laurel Hell . Look, let’s just get started with the positives. I think, as always, her vocals shine through quite a bit through the new sound and this new combo works surprisingly well. Even with the more synthesized production choices, it feels just a tiny bit forced. I'm sure that Mitski wanted this albums’s sound to go in this di...

No, let the plane out of the bag, they’re gonna suffocate in there!! At the time of writing this, today is the first anniversary of British post-punk outfit Black Country, New Road’s magnificent debut album, For the first time . For context, that was one of the first albums I officially gave a perfect score, and honestly, it’s stayed that way ever since. I’ve avoided the singles for this album successfully and I haven’t even heard the leaked live performances because I’m simply that excited for this. I did get a little scared about this just before its release. The frontman of the group, Isaac Wood, left the group due to mental health reasons and cancelled the international tour they were set to embark on. Obviously, mental health is a huge issue and I respect the choice Wood made with his group. However, Wood is the vocalist of the group and a very dynamic performer. It wouldn’t affect this album, but what about their future? Either way, Ants From Up There is finally here. Let’s get ...