It's hard to escape the idea that Donald Glover's taking the piss. His prior Childish Gambino hiphop turns seemed like earnest variation at best, hokey once-removed Weird Al-ism at worst. And here he turns his eye to funk - specifically drawing /hard/ on Funkadelic spacy groovecraft and Sly communal up-an-attem.
But it's mostly for the best. I mean, first of all, that space hasn't been tapped half as hard as it deserves.
Second, this takes that space and grows it, into something wilder than even Clinton would have necessarily dared. It brings its own juice to the party. That bass, too, damn.
And the vocals are so thoroughly postproductioned: ripped, clipped, autotuned -- but, I buy it, somehow.
And, shit, that second side just gets spacy as shit, losing the thread altogether -- but its weirdly the right move.
This never quite escapes the orbit of its influences, always seeming relative-to, and at times (Zombies) it's just hokey. But it pulls off that Zappa-level yes-and often enough to win my affection, and occasional outright adoration. Derivative or not, it does what it does pretty darn well, and dammit, we're overdue for another dose of this shit 4/5
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Agree in general with your assessment of Gambino, excepting a couple of single highlights (e.g. "We Ain't Them"). Well, no. I think _Because The Internet_ is worth consideration.
ReplyDeleteAnd this, too, is promising. We'll see if he can take off.