CATCH-UP REVIEW! Run the Jewels, Remo Drive, Lady Gaga, Alestorm + 5 Others

This is a new thing I'll be doing where I do some shorter catch-up reviews, as it's difficult to write novels about every single album I hear and there are a lot of things I want to be able to cover yet struggle to find the time. I'll be covering 10 records here, and I'll be tackling them in order from highest score to lowest.

Run the Jewels - RTJ4

I really wish this wasn’t my first full length experience from Run the Jewels, because I’ve clearly been missing out. I’m a bit frustrated this came out when it did given I had so much going on in my life, as I’m pretty bummed I didn’t get the time to write a full length review on this one. What I did get though, was an album that blew the roof off my headphones and everything wrong with the world as we know it. This is an example of aggression and passion in music hitting home in the kind of way that transforms that pain and anger into comfort food for the soul. Fittingly given there is a Zach De La Rocha feature, this gives me the same feeling as those classic Rage Against the Machine albums did. This just makes me want to get up and fight for what’s right, no matter what the cost is. I don’t even mean that entirely as a parallel to what’s going on in the world right now, but more so as a sentiment to just how motivating and inspiring this record is. This is the kind of music that just makes you want to seize the day and go to bed at the end of it having no regrets. Every beat on this bad boy has so much energy and punch to it, perfectly matching the energetic and murderous performances from both Killer Mike and El-P. These guys seriously slaughtered each one of these songs with dope verses that strike a perfect balance between Public Enemy-esque Punk energy and classic Boom Bap flair. Between them destroying every beat they hop on and some of the most notable features of the year from the RATM frontman Zach and incredible contributions from Josh Homme and Mavis Staples, everyone on this album brought their A game. If you’re even mildly interested into this kind of intense, political Rap I would highly suggest checking this out as soon as possible, if you haven’t already considering how late to the part I am. Run the Jewels have delivered a dynamic, electrifying release with their fourth record and I haven’t been able to get enough of it since it dropped. - 8.8/10 (Best Songs - Walking in the Snow, JU$T ft. Pharell Williams & Zach de la Rocha, Pulling the Pin ft. Mavis Staples & Josh Homme)

Remo Drive - A Portrait of an Ugly Man

Man, this album got such a bad wrap. Trust me, I am the furthest thing from a fan of Remo Drive’s last record Natural, Everyday Degradation, but this one just really got the short end of the stick critically. It seems like people pretty much gave up on enjoying this record before they even heard it, as so many have decided that they want Remo Drive to be a band that only had one good album. If you give this thing a few honest listens though, you will find an Indie Rock record that has so many rewarding grooves and melodies that it has nearly infinite replay value. The production choices you hear on moments like the bridge to A Guide to Live By are tremendous and extremely immersive. So many of the melodies you hear during moments like the chorus of If I’ve Ever Looked Too Deep In Thought remind me of the kind of thing Josh Homme from Queens of the Stone Age would write, in the best way. The guitar work, best exemplified by the excellent chord choice and riffs you hear on songs like A Flower and a Weed or The Ugly Man Sings is nothing short of electrifying. The vocal performance and over aesthetic and ethos of the record is one that feels entirely unique to me, both in the context of Remo Drive’s discography and in the Indie Rock scene in general. People just dismissed this one as some basic, forgettable Indie record without actually giving it a fair chance and I’m honestly pretty passionately upset by that. This is such an articulate and well penned album with so many twists and turns that keep me on my toes throughout every listen. There are so many hooks and melodies that are constantly stuck in my head, tons of guitar riffs that I find myself wanting to learn, and even ideas I want to incorporate into my own songwriting. I will admit that Ode to Joy 2 was a bit of a weak spot, but other than that I just can’t get enough of this album. I think this is such a natural evolution for the band, as they seem to be admitting that they’ve run out of ideas in the Pop Punk world. They’ve moved onto a different sound that incorporates lots of the somber, melancholy tones of their old material and applied to a sound that feels new and fresh in the context of their discography. I really, genuinely think that this one is going to become a cult favorite amongst Remo Drive fans, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it gets a bit of critical reappraisal over the years. Part of me fears that so many people will just continue to not want to see Remo Drive succeed, but I will be the first to attest that this record is nearly as high quality as Greatest Hits was. Yeah, I said it. I can already tell everyone will just flag this as a hot take and look at me like a moron, but y’all are wrong about this one. Remo Drive’s A Portrait of an Ugly Man is, in my opinion, the most refreshing and unique follow up to their sophomore slump that they could have come up with. This is such a rewarding grower of a listen, and I really hope that time will be kind enough to it to convince its detractors to come around on what it has to offer. Don’t listen to the hate, give this one a listen and give it a chance. - 8.6/10 (Best Songs - If I’ve Ever Looked Too Deep In Thought, The Ugly Man Sings, A Flower and a Weed) Emery - White Line Fever Somewhere in between Thrice and Anberlin, Emo/Post Hardcore band Emery have been maintaining a consistently exciting and enjoyable discography for 16 years now. While the band has brought themselves into an era of a more tame sound than the aggressive unclean vocals and rampaging guitars of the old days, they’ve still got some bite for sure. This record brings so many cool ideas to the table that mostly really remind of their last record, but simultaneously does quite a lot to set itself apart. Not to harp on the Thrice comparisons too much, but a lot of this record reminds me of the more progressive tracks from Thrice’s latest effort Palms. It definitely doesn’t have anything like that record that reminds me of CCM, but many of the somber, mature and articulate chord progressions and vocals give me a similar vibe. This record does such an awesome job of conveying so many deep and thoughtful emotions, and at the end of the day it’s an album for those who have grown up with Emery over the years. The band does such an awesome job of articulating everything they’ve got on their minds so perfectly on here, mostly pertaining to excellent perspectives on relationships and longing that I can particularly relate to personally right now. They also manage to cram so many different ideas and concepts within each of these songs that make them all feel so much more progressive and winding than you’d expect. The runtime of each track is relatively short, but most every song on here feels twice as long (in a good way). These are complex, emotionally charged and intriguing Emo tracks that definitely live up to the standard of the Emery discography, easily. I would say there are a couple moments here and there where things can come off just slightly too blunt, but that’s always an extremely trivial and fleeting issue. I’d also say that there are occasionally moments where I felt just slightly less engaged than I did during the record’s highlights, such as during the first couple minutes of Some of Us. It doesn’t effect the quality of the album much though, as for the most part I found myself eating up every song and actually being really emotionally touched by this album. White Line Fever is a really solid effort from Emery, and I think it just might get me on a kick to go back through the band’s discography and relisten to all the awesome songs they’ve put out over the years. - 8.5/10 (Best Songs - The Noose, Biddy, Civil Wars) Alestorm - The Curse of the Crystal Coconut Woah, this thing is so much fun. Despite hearing that one song about an anchor from watching UKOGMonkey play Guitar Hero on Twitch for years, I’ve never actually properly listened to these guys. I always just thought they were some kind of meme band (which they are) and that they didn’t also have some musical chops to back that up. Thankfully, I was pretty decisively mistaken in that assumption because this record definitely has more to it than just some guys shouting about treasure and rum. There’s plenty of that too don’t get me wrong, but there are some really awesome hooks and guitar riffs here that mesh so well with the pirate voices and scottish Folk instruments. They’ve got plenty of Power Metal, Folk Metal, and even Hardcore Punk influences on this thing that creates a really awesome sound that sounds so much more fitting than you’d expect. On top of just how fun the music is, the whole comedy schtick going on is actually pretty hilarious. It’s extremely raunchy, pretty immature at points and most importantly gets its point across in a very straightforward way. Alestorm is here to have fun, get drunk and make loads of money - nothing else. Songs like Sh*t Boat (No Fans) and Pirate Metal Drinking Crew are absolutely hilarious, and what really impresses me is how they manage to fit a song like that amongst other tracks that actually have a much more serious tone in comparison. Overall, this is a wicked fun little record that just oozes charm, humor and metal out of every song. Curse of the Crystal Coconut made for a fantastic introduction to Alestorm for me, one that I won’t forget anytime soon for sure. These guys have such a unique and awesome sound (and gimmick) that makes for some truly hilarious and punchy Pirate Metal. - 7.8/10 (Best Songs - Zombies Ate My Pirate Ship, Sh*t Boat (No Fans), Wooden Leg Pt. 2) Lady Gaga - Chromatica With a 4 year wait between Lady Gaga’s newest and her last LP Joanne, she’s given listeners something of a return to her roots with a record that tends to remind of the boisterous Electropop we got from her back around the turn of the decade. After Joanne left her fanbase split between those who loved her more Contemporary sounding evolution and those who just wished she’d stick to her roots, this is kind of surprising to me. Gaga is an artist that, love or hate her, has always done whatever in the world it is that she wants to do regardless of what anybody has to say about it. Given that tendency of hers, I kind of figured she’d continue to go down the more tame route she took in 2016 as I guess I just assumed that’s the direction she personally wanted to go in now. That must have changed over the last four years though, as while this is still much less weird (and occasionally obnoxious) as her older stuff was it’s still quite reminiscent of that era in her career. She’s replaced the acoustic guitars and Country influences we got last time with synthesizers galore, EDM-inspired beats with plenty of pounding bass and that monotone speaking voice she used to use all the time. I’m sure there are about the same number of people that are excited by that description as there are those that are turned off by it. I, for one, have always been moderately lukewarm on both phases of her career as I found that both had their flaws. I did take more of a liking to Joanne though, which might admittedly be a result of me being far from the target audience of her breakout albums. All those factors coming together on Chromatica wound up in me finding this one to actually be a really awesome balance between all the different styles she’s gone through over the years. While I’m far from a huge Lady Gaga fan anyways I’d say this is probably the most fun I’ve ever had with one of her albums. Something I didn’t expect was that I had a ton of fun with the more upbeat and vibrant Pop songs on the record. I tend to cringe everytime I hear Pokerface and Born This Way (again, I know I’m not the target demographic) so this came as quite a surprise. Songs like Stupid Love, Rain On Me and 911 stuck out as the most memorable and awesome songs on the album. They’ve got such upbeat and colorful instrumentals that I really just can’t get enough of. She’s really found her Electropop groove so naturally as if she never took a departure from this sound, and her performance naturally meshes with these instrumentals beautifully. This is still the kind of thing that I probably wouldn’t have even bothered listening to if I didn’t have a girlfriend, but I’ve got to appreciate the fact that even I can find something to enjoy on this thing. I think she’s found a really solid middle ground between her more mature A Star Is Born stuff and her super out there, meat-dress era. This has so much more balance and unified composition than any of her other albums, and while my opinion may differ quite a bit from what I’ve read from those more familiar with her stuff I really do think that makes this her best album to date. I won’t say that there aren’t quite a few songs on here that I wasn’t a big fan of though, mostly because they just left me without much of an impression. Nothing here stuck out as bad whatsoever, but songs like Alice, Fun Tonight and Replay struck me as pretty boring and run of the mill. They’re all well produced and sound fantastic, but they just didn’t leave me with any sort of impression whatsoever. I think the most disappointing point on the record would be the track with Elton John though, as his inclusion on the song is so minimal and forgettable that I can’t even remember what he contributed without replaying the song. It’s a fairly anticlimactic song that feels like a waste of a collaboration that could have been decade-defining levels of legendary. I’ve also just never been a fan of her awkward speaking voice thing she does on songs like Babylon, but I’m aware that’s an entirely subjective thing and that most of her fans actually love it so I’ll keep my mouth shut. Overall, I found this to be a really enjoyable record that took me by surprise with how much I wound up getting into it. It did have a couple of low points and dips that I won’t find myself coming back to, but at the end of the day I’m honestly just left pretty surprised by how many songs I added to playlists. If a straight white dude like me can get as much out of Chromatica as I did, I can’t imagine how awesome this is to anybody who fits into Lady Gaga’s target demographic. There are definitely some obvious flaws and pitfalls here and there, but for the most part this stands up tall as the most complete sounding and balanced record she’s ever put out. - 7.2/10 (Best Songs - Stupid Love, Rain On Me ft. Ariana Grande, 911) Dirty Projectors - Flight Tower I’m surprised I actually even listened to this, honestly. The only full length I’ve heard from Dirty Projectors before this was Lamp Lit Prose, a record that I personally found to be pretty hard to sit through. I admired the ambition and heart that was at the core of that record, but there were just so many tedious and grating tracks that I have never and will never revisit it ever again. For whatever reason, I figured I should give this group another chance though. I still haven’t gone back and listened to the records that are the reason why people actually listen to them, but I figured I’d tackle this new EP regardless. This is basically what their last LP would’ve sounded like if it was any good. This is an ambitious, artsy and glamorous little project with some awesome ideas and solid execution. It’s not the most memorable thing I’ve ever heard and I probably won’t go out of my way to hear it again, but that’s not to say it doesn’t have some really good moments. Lose Your Love in particular is just such an awesome song, one that’s so good that it almost makes up for Lamp Lit Prose. Not quite, but almost. The tweaked and chopped little vocal samples used in the beat are so soulful and comforting in the best possible ways, and it’s so cool to hear how the group turned it into such a groovy little Art Pop cut. The rest of the EP represents such a massive step up in quality as well, with much more attention to detail being put it into the stickiness of the melodies than last time around. They keep much of those noisier elements that were on the last album, but utilize them much more effectively here. The cluttered rhythms of Self Design remind me of the more tedious stuff they’ve put out, but this time the melodies and funky guitars tie those sounds together in a way that makes them gratifying instead of giving me a headache. As it is just a bite sized little 11 minute project it is just a little drop in the pond, but if this is any indication of the increase in quality Dirty Projectors will be delivering in the future, I’m pretty excited. Flight Tower is a head over heels improvement over Dirty Projector’s last LP Lamp Lit Prose, and it brings some pretty brilliant ideas to the table. - 7.2/10 (Best Songs - Lose Your Love, Self Design) Caligula’s Horse - Rise Radiant Falling somewhere in between Dream Theater, Between the Buried and Me and Tool, Australian Prog Metal band Caligula’s Horse has seriously been making quite the name for themselves over the last couple of years. Their latest release Rise Radiant seems like it’ll easily be their biggest release yet, and given their musical talent and obvious chops for the genre they’re working with it seems pretty obvious as to why. This newest full length effort from the band is an extremely tight, complex and winding release will definitely give Prog heads plenty to drool over for hours and hours. It passes the Djent test with flying colors with songs like Slow Violence taking plenty of notes out of Periphery’s book. It’s got tons of shimmery synths a la Dream Theater worked into tracks like the opener The Tempest. The vocals are exclusively clean, which might turn off some of those who are more into the heavier side of this kind of thing, but they work really well and once again give those good old DT vibes at times. This is the kind of album (and band) that just checks all of the boxes, delivering something that’s super fitting for the style of music they belong to without straying too far from the path. Granted, they do a fantastic job of sticking to that path, with so many of these songs delivering some crazy good riffage and memorable moments that will definitely keep me coming back here and there. In a year that’s been pretty slow for high profile Prog Metal releases so far, I’d say I’m definitely pretty down for something like this that’s just a straightforward reminder of how much I love the genre. However, as I alluded to earlier this is not the kind of album that reinvents the wheel in the slightest. I feel extremely pretentious for criticizing a Prog Metal album of all things for not being “interesting” enough, so I want to preface that I have no issue with an album not being the most unique thing on the planet. I mean, I gave Beartooth’s Disease a 9/10 in 2018 so that’s definitely not an inherent diss in my eyes. There are plenty of goosebump inducing harmonies and killer riffs that keep me coming back here, but the record does seem to have a bit of an identity crisis. To say they wear their influences on their sleeves is an understatement, as if you played me any of these songs and told me it was a new song from Time, the Valuator or even BTBAM I’d probably believe you. Any Prog Metal like this is right up my alley so once again I definitely enjoyed this quite a bit, but I can’t help but knock it down a few pegs because it’s lack of originality left me without much of an impression once it was off. Rise Radiant is a really enjoyable and straightforward release from Caligula’s Horse that will scratch that itch for new Prog Metal I’m sure many of us have right now. However, the next time we get a notable Prog Metal release this year I won’t be surprised if everybody kind of just forgets about this one. - 7.1/10 (Best Songs - The Tempest, Slow Violence, Valkyrie) Grey Daze - Amends I am so happy to hear Chester’s voice again. Before I get into this album any further, I want to say that all of my gripes with it pale in comparison to the fact that it gave me more music and time to hear from one of my favorite musicians of all time. I cannot thank this album and this band’s reunion enough for bringing more of the incredible talent Chester Bennington had into my life. It’s especially awesome to hear his vocals in the context of a slightly Nu-Metal tinged sound like this, given that it’s been ages since Linkin Park sounded even remotely like this. Don’t get me wrong, I even love Linkin Park’s experimental stuff and I’ve come around on most of their Pop material too, but there’s just something refreshing to hear Chester singing this kind of music again. It’s also an incredibly bittersweet emotional rollercoaster to sit through this one, even three years after Chester’s death, but it’s still really great to get a few more amazing songs out of him. As for the quality of the record outside of Chester’s awesome vocal performance, this does leave a little bit to be desired. There are some really strong highlight moments, most notably the extremely great Just Like Heroin, that bring seriously tremendous ideas to the table. Honestly, if we got an entire album that matched the quality of that song I would write a million words on it and I’d probably give it an insanely high score. Hearing Chester deliver such a chilling performance both lyrically and vocally, on top of fantastically produced backing vocal samples and guitar riffs makes for a song that is legitimately perfect. That’s not to say that there is anything on this album that is awful or even bad actually, but nothing compares to that track. There are some certain highlights that I’ll likely come back to very frequently, but many of the tracks on here do feel just a bit dated and lacking. B12 is an example of a song that I subjectively really enjoy, but find myself struggling to get into just a little bit because it just feels so dated. This is a very 2000’s album in both the best and worst of ways, and I don’t think I need to explain why that’s a double edged sword. Despite it’s issues, I would more than recommend giving Grey Daze’s Amends a spin so that you can experience what is likely going to be the last full length LP Chester ever made. On top of just revisiting that man’s incredible talent, there are some really bright and replayable songs on here that are worth your time on their own merits as well. It has some weak spots and an overall sense of being a bit dated, but there is a lot of good here. - 6.3/10 (Best Songs - Just Like Heroin, B12, She Shines) Currents - The Way It Ends This is a really solid Metalcore album. Unfortunately, there isn’t really that much more I can say about it at the end of the day. It’s decent. It’s extremely heavy, drop tuned and aggressive from start to finish. It doesn’t bring anything new to the table, and it doesn’t feel as groundbreaking and standout as their last record did. It’s got plenty of alright tracks that will keep your head banging the whole time they’re on, but I highly doubt there’s going to be a ton of people championing this as one of the best Metal albums of the year. Everything is pretty well played, with the guitars and rhythm section particularly maintaining such a fast and heavy groove very well. The vocals are something that I found to be pretty indistinct here, basically borrowing from all the factors in a Metalcore vocal performance that you’d expect. There are lots of melodic parts, honestly more than I expected, and the throaty screams we get from Brian Wille do their job pretty well. There are some obvious production flaws here as well, which is unfortunate because getting clear recordings and mixing is seriously essential to a good Metalcore album given that there is always so much going on. The guitars and vocals always feel like they are battling for center stage, and there are a couple of moments (like right before the breakdown on Flag to Wave) where things get a little quiet when they aren’t supposed to. It’s nothing too glaring or awful, but more so just something that contributes to how “alright” this album. It’s exactly that. It’s an alright Metalcore album that does a lot of Metalcore things, and not too much more. If you’re a huge fan of the genre I’m sure you’ll get plenty of mileage out of this bad boy, but I’m willing to bet there won’t be a single person who doesn’t typically enjoy the genre and happens to enjoy this. That’s not inherently an awful thing of course, but it’s just another thing that goes to show how middle of the road this album is. I’d like to hear a lot more tracks like Better Days out of these guys in the future, as I think they’re often at their best when they’re at their most technical. As this record shows, they can get boring pretty quickly when all that’s going on is Djent chugging. The Way It Ends is a slightly disappointing follow up to The Place I Feel Safest, the really enjoyable record that put Currents on everybody’s radar in the first place. - 5.5/10 (Best Songs - Kill the Ache, Origin, Better Days) Lil Yachty - Lil Boat 3 While I have definitely come around a bit on the quirky 2016 classic debut from Lil Boat, I cannot say the same for anything else I have heard from the guy ever since. After Teenage Emotions dropped and killed so much of his hype right off the rip, every project I’ve heard from Miles McCollum since has just been so severely disappointing. I mean really, Lil Boat 2 is one of my least favorite Trap releases of all time with the way it embodies all of the most frustrating and generic tropes in the genre and turns it all up to 11. I’m of the rare opinion that Nuthin’ 2 Prove was actually a step up from that, but if anything it once again showed that Yachty actually still had quite a lot to prove when it comes to his music. His post-2016 output has ranged from absolutely horrible to below average, so while I want a good Yachty album as bad as everyone else you can probably understand why I have such low expectations. At this point when I fire up something new from the guy, I just hope for a mere handful of solid tracks that I might come back to once or twice. That really seems like the best case scenario. Thankfully, I’d say this record (at the very least) matches up to that best case scenario by delivering just a couple of solid bangers that I wouldn’t mind hearing again. That’s not to say this is anywhere near a good project overall, as there are definitely more cons than pros (which I’ll get to in a bit). However, I for one am pretty happy to get anything at all that’s decent from the guy. I’ll start by addressing the only two tracks here that really have much traction at all - T.D. and Oprah’s Bank Account. I’ve got to say, these are probably two of the biggest bangers Yachty has put out in the last 4 years. They definitely deserve to be the two tracks that are starting to bring the spotlight back on him just a bit. The verses from Tyler, Rocky and especially Tierra Whack are really fantastic and keep me coming back to the Tokyo Drift sampling rager - that Yachty got brutally carried on. Oprah’s Bank Account is another one that has so much hit potential with it’s solid beat and pretty alright features from Drake and Da Baby - that Yachty got slightly carried on. I think you’re probably already figuring out where this review is headed. I will say that there are a couple of songs I actually think Yachty slaughtered on this thing, as he’s given a couple of performances that are the most true to himself we’ve gotten in years. Songs like Love Jones, Range Rover Sports Truck and especially Can’t Go are the closest he’s come to recreating that Lil Boat 1 energy that he’s gotten since, well, Lil Boat 1. However, I’d say there are only 7 out of the 19 tracks on this thing that I would ever consider relistening to. Everything after track 12 is completely useless, and there are a couple of holes in the first half as well. Yachty still suffers from his inability to stop following trends and stick to what made him such an interesting young rapper in the first place. There are so many tracks here with washed out, generic guitar-based Emo Rap beats that feature Boat auto crooning his heart out. These are the most criminally garbage tracks he’s gotten stuck into making throughout the last three years. Nobody asked for half-baked Emo Rap from the guy with the fruit loop teeth that everyone fell in love with because of his upbeat personality and quirky, fun sound. He’s also got so many songs where he tries to act super tough and rap about guns and all that, which once again is just the most unconvincing thing in the world. It’s the polar opposite of why everybody fell in love with his image in the first place, yet he can’t seem to understand that. As long as Yachty keeps filling up his records with generic Emo Rap and the kind of Trap you’d expect from Future he’s never going to reclaim the throne he once had back in the year of his XXL Freshman inclusion. Furthermore, he got totally carried on so many of the best songs on here. Till the Morning is extremely boring until Young Thug saves the track, Yachty gets out-rapped in circles by everyone else on T.D., and the big names on Oprah’s Bank Account save that one too. It shouldn’t be surprising that once again Lil Yachty has completely failed to play to his strengths and has once again served up another offering of the most generic Trap you could ever imagine. However, I guess I’m pretty happy with this one in comparison to his last three, all things considered. There are at the very least a solid couple of songs here that are the best he’s put out since he came out, so at least there’s that. The pros definitely don’t outweigh the cons here though, as by the time I reached the second half of the record I found myself feeling so bored and annoyed that I had a raging headache by track 19. Lil Boat 3 is a filler-filled, mediocre record that’s got plenty of what you’d expect from a Lil Yachty record in 2020. However, I’ll give him credit for managing to at least scrounge up a couple of fun songs that are much better than I thought they were going to be. He may have been carried on a handful of the highlights, but I guess Yachty fans have to take what little they get at this point in his career. - 4.6/10 (Best Songs - T.D. ft. A$AP Rocky, Tyler the Creator & Tierra Whack, Can’t Go, Range Rover Sports Truck ft. Lil Keed)