Album Review: Cooly G - Playin Me

Cooly G
Playin Me
Review: Yeah Daddy Make Me Want It

Vocalist and producer Cooly G (Merrisa Campbell) made her mark a few years ago as a rising star in the UK funky scene, but has since evolved into a multi-faceted producer, imbuing her debut for the Hyperdub label with a cross-genre mashup of funky, grime, 2-step, techno, and R&B. The album has a overall dubby feel, hearkening back to neo-soul albums from Soul II Soul, Massive Attack, and Sade, but with a more modern/electronic sheen. While not explicitly noted as such, Playin Me feels like a breakup album, full of melancholic moments, whispered vocals, incriminations, doubts, and fears. Just when you think a happy moment appears, the hurt appears again to plunge back down into the darkness.

Beginning with the shifting, retro-like "He Said I Said," sputtering drum programs and looped guitars echo in and out of the mix setting the tone for the record, Cooly G haunted by memories of her lover.



"Come Into My Room" merges dusky vocals, piano, and skying electronics, showing a letting down of her guard, wanting to experience love again.



"Good Times" descends again into a bleak, dark drone of low synth pulses over a muted 2-step beat, sling-shotting into the skittering beats and come-ons of "Sunshine," a tempered take on the make-out jam. But throughout, there is always that spectre of the love gone bad; never allowing for any true happiness. Title track "Playin Me" bounces tattered beats and rim shots over clipped vocal samples.



Although Playin Me is not a traditional pop record in the normal sense, there is a nod to something more mainstream in Cooly G's cover of Coldplay's "Trouble," which fits in perfectly with the mood of the album, with its lyrics of being in "a spiderweb/and I'm caught in the middle." The original's lovely melancholy transferring well into a clattering 2-step beat. But the remainder of the record has a tense, foreboding feel to it, full of dense drum programming and icy keyboards. The hallucinatory opening of "Is It Gone" giving way to a cacophony of stuttering drum programs. "What Airtime" blasting chilly waves of frosty synths over almost chanted vocals. These moments are only broken up occasionally, as with the clonky drums and martial air of "It's Serious."



Or with final track "Up In My Head" providing a respite from the tension with a bed of warm synths over a soft, feminine vocal from Cooly G.



Playin Me is a solid debut from Cooly G that highlights her obvious producer chops while only suffering slightly from some of the tracks sounding tonally similar. A little more variation would have made a lot of these tracks stand out more. But is a minor quibble about an artist with a good future ahead of her.

Rating Scale:

Chilfos: masterpiece; coolest thing I've heard in ages.

Woof Daddy: excellent; just a hair away from being a masterpiece.

Grrrr: very good; will definitely be considered for my top releases of the year.

Yeah Daddy Make Me Want It: good; definitely invites further listens and piques one's interest for more material.

Meh: not horrible, but certainly not great; could have either been polished, trimmed, or re-thought.

Jeez Lady: what the hell happened? Just plain bad. They should hang their heads in shame and be forced to listen to Lady Gaga ad nauseam as penance.

Tragicistani: so bad, armed villagers with pitchforks and torches should run the artist out of the country for inflicting this abomination on the human race.

Album Review - DVA: Pretty Ugly

DVA
Pretty Ugly
Rating: Yeah Daddy Make Me Want It

Leon 'Scratcha DVA' Smart is well-known as the former host of Rinse FM's Grimey Breakfast Show and also as a producer in the grime and UK funky genres. Pretty Ugly is his debut full length on the Hyperdub label, and despite his past reputation, the album is not solely a collection of grime and UK funky tracks; instead, it is a surprisingly diverse collection of broken beat tracks that never seems comfortable staying in the same pattern for long. Interestingly, the album seems to show a marked influence from the Flying Lotus Beat Music collective, with a focus on hazy vibes and singularly off-kilter programming. Mixing things up further are the use of multiple vocalists that, despite a bevy of different styles, seem to work well and flow in and out of each other with ease. True to its title, Pretty Ugly enjoys the contrast between the beautiful and harsh; either pushing unsteady, brutish beats against gorgeous vocal melodies or adding incongruous noises to infiltrate an otherwise beautiful keyboard line.

I'm not generally a fan of electronic artists that throw vocalists onto tracks on their albums for some semblance of mainstream appeal. Too often, the tracks come across as someone just coming in late and adding lyrics/vocals to an instrumental track, without there being much of a consensus beforehand. Strangely, on Pretty Ugly the vocal tracks come across better than the instrumentals, the earthiness of the vocals adding a through line for the broken beat compositions. "Just Vybe" features a shuffling, clunky rhythm and burbling bed of electronics as a canvas for Fatima's deep throaty growl,



"Why U Do" mutates a 2 step beat under organ drones and AL's tale of a woman wronged and her man's comeuppance, and most beautifully, Natalie Maddix adds her soulful voice to the woozy, dreamy "Eye Know."



Muhsinah hauntingly sighs over the skittering beats of "33rd Degree," becoming more and more despondent as the track speeds towards its conclusion. Victor Duplaix's vocals push against the stumbling beats and fantasy analog synths of "Madness."



I preferred the vocal tracks, not so much because the instrumentals felt lacking, the vocals just gave a sense of balance and control over the electronics, which sometimes could become oppressive. "Reach The Sun" uses almost 1:30 of its run time on a disjointed/atonal electronic intro before bouncing into a rhythmic fantasy world of blooping keyboards and sampled voices. "Polyphonic Dreams" features pounding beats and swirling analog synths which threaten to derail over glitchy feedback.



The throbbing pulse of "Bare Fuzz" is broken up by warm vibes and looped, almost tribal chanting.



And it all ends with the hauntingly grand "Where I Belong" with droning synth stings and horns, that closes out the album on a slightly funeral tone.



Pretty Ugly is a well-produced, intriguing debut from DVA whose parts are better than the sum of the whole. Ultimately, it feels like a interesting collection of tracks that don't really have any connecting thread. For me, this made for a pleasant listen, but didn't add up to anything more. DVA is always going to put out well-crafted tracks, I am just going to have to wait a little longer for a more cohesive statement from him.

Rating Scale:

Chilfos: masterpiece; coolest thing I've heard in ages.

Woof Daddy: excellent; just a hair away from being a masterpiece.

Grrrr: very good; will definitely be considered for my top releases of the year.

Yeah Daddy Make Me Want It: good; definitely invites further listens and piques one's interest for more material.

Meh: not horrible, but certainly not great; could have either been polished, trimmed, or re-thought.

Jeez Lady: what the hell happened? Just plain bad. They should hang their heads in shame and be forced to listen to Lady Gaga ad nauseam as penance.

Tragicistani: so bad, armed villagers with pitchforks and torches should run the artist out of the country for inflicting this abomination on the human race.