Review Summary: You're cool, but B L A C K I E is colder
Noise and hip hop are two genres that, upon first glance, seem completely incompatible. Hip hop as a musical genre focuses heavily on structure, especially when it comes to vocals, and noise is just, well, noise. These two musical genres have almost nothing to do with each other, so of course there’s someone out there who has the balls to combine them. That person goes by the stylistic name of
B L A C K I E… All Caps, With Spaces (no joke, that’s his actual stage name).
Dumb name aside, B L A C K I E is an interesting artist. His beats are heavily compressed loops of pure, lo-fi shrieks and squeals. “Living My Life As A Stereotype” in particular is one hell of an aural assault: The track is essentially a barrage of high pitched drum beats, laminated with a repetitive, distorted loop of the word “blackie” that has more clipping in it than a
Whitehouse album! “My Window”, however, is one of the few songs that isn’t a complete noisefest. This track opens with a surprisingly
pretty keyboard loop that eventually grows into a full on cathartic epic, complete with thick bass and an army of drums. The lyrics
“I feel like I barely made it, like I’m God’s favorite”, when combined with B L A C K I E’s energetic performance, add a surprising layer of optimism to the track.
Speaking of, his performance throughout the record is very nice. It can range from furious yelling (as seen on “Look At You”) to smooth rapping, which is exemplified very well on “Dope & Doper”. Here, we see him rap with ease, calmly reminding us that “[we’re] cool, but [he’s] colder” in an absolutely smooth fashion. The beat on this track is also worthy of mention, combining a low-quality loop of tribal drums with a droning bassline.
Now, while B L A C K I E has created a fresh style and tone for himself with this album, there are still many negative aspects to be found in it. Some of the shorter tracks such as “Look At You” and “Who Protect Us From You” could of either been fleshed out more or just could've been removed from the album. In fact, many tracks on the LP could’ve been fleshed out more, for most of them simply feel a little unfinished.
Does any of this mean this is a bad record? Far from it,
Spred Luv is an intriguing experiment that combines noise and hip hop in an enjoyable manner that is sure to please many hungry noise enthusiasts. While some of his later recordings are perhaps better starting places for this artist,
Spred Luv is not a record to completely dismiss.
