Make a sandwich and go to sleep

Mix 30: Brazil, Côte d'Ivoire, and Thailand shine; drill both sexy and not-so-sexy get a fair shake; plus Christian rock and (false?) idols

Me, doing a deep dive on ‘70s Christian rock: “This better not awaken anything in me…”

If you missed it, I posted my top Japanese albums of 1974. I have learned a lot and purchased one (1) book on the subject! Learning is fun!

Not much else to report — more people seem to be moving from Twitter over to Bluesky, so if you’re looking for music chat, that may be a place to consider. You will find Kent Beeson’s album polls running at his Best Albums Bracket Bsky account. The Year 2000 poll starts this month. Some of us have even attempted a disciplined prediction bracket for it. (If I do miserably again, I’ll have to get to work on a prediction model.)

Still working on a few non-weekly-mix posts, one on Willow, one on People’s Pop, one on my 1974 list. The ‘74 Japan deep dive was a lot of fun; have been toying doing it for 1970’s Christian music (the newsletter header image today is Narnia’s Aslan Is Not a Tame Lion, a/k/a Narnia), which is (surprisingly) one of the other pockets of music that is drawing my attention a bit as I finally gave up on my 1974 slog, along with Eastern Europe (specifically Poland, Romania, and Hungary), Korea, and country music, none of which got a fair enough shake before I gave up.

Here’s my final submitted list. You can see the full list of other albums I checked out here.

ALBUMS

1. Tuca: Drácula I Love You
2. Ema Sugimoto: Emma Is Love
3. Slapp Happy: Slapp Happy
4. New York Dolls: New York Dolls in…Too Much Too Soon
5. Miles Davis: Get Up With It
6. Hugh Masekela: I Am Not Afraid
7. Mulatu Astatke: Ethio Jazz
8. Neil Young: On the Beach
9. Queen: Sheer Heart Attack
10. Robin Trower: Bridge of Sighs
11. Chie Sawa: 23 (Twenty-Three Years Old)
12. Kim Jung Mi: Kim Jung Mi
13. Gedo: Gedo
14. Nilüfer: Nilüfer LP
15. Hall and Oates: War Babies
16. Chairmen of the Board: Skin I’m In
17. Lou Reed: Sally Can’t Dance
18. Transsylvania Phoenix: Mugur de fluier
19. Bo Diddley: Big Bad Bo
20. Dana Gillespie: Weren't Born A Man

SINGLES

Shirley and Co: Shame Shame Shame
Gloria Gaynor: Never Can Say Goodbye
Linda Ronstadt: You’re No Good
Cher: Train of Thought
Patti Smith: Piss Factory
Shuggie Otis: Aht Uh Mi Hed
Jeanette: Porque te vas?
Dry Bread: Yamar
Gladys Knight: On and On
Sadistic Mika Band: Time Machine

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Mix 1 // Mix 2 // Mix 3 // Mix 4 // Mix 5 // Mix 6 // Mix 7 // Mix 8 // Mix 9 // Mix 10 // Mix 11 // Mix 12 // Mix 13 // Mix 14 // Mix 15 // Mix 16 // Mix 17 // Mix 18 // Mix 19 // Mix 20 // Mix 21 // Mix 22 // Mix 23 // Mix 24 // Mix 25 // Mix 26 // Mix 27 // Mix 28 // Mix 29

MIX 30: MAKE A SANDWICH AND GO TO SLEEP

1. MC BF, MC BN, DJ YUZAK: Ritmadinha do Mario

2. MC Zaqui, Dj Win: Tira A Roupa

3. LXNGVX, Slowboy, Bibi Babydoll: Montagem Bibi Game

Let’s kick things off with some funk, shall we? I remember searching for MC BF et al’s rework of Super Mario World on Spotify and not finding it, but it showed up on one of my funk playlists this week, along with their subtler attempt in December to do the same thing with The Ocarina of Time. I would have never thought to look for the natural “hard clave” rhythm in Mario music, but it’s in there.

After that, a pretty music-box funk entry that MC Zaqui’s melody carries, and finally a cocoon of day-glo and noise that can just barely contain Bibi Babydoll at the center, like a character in a Marvel comic who needs a special holding cell to avoid accidentally blowing up the world. It’s the first baile funk that I think would be cool to see in the Sphere.

Would be remiss not to link to the wildest funk track I’ve heard recently, but it’s Soundcloud-only: A billdifferen-scavenged face-melter called (deep breath, copy-and-paste fingers ready) NAÇÃOREBOLATION69, “ULTIMATROMBETA [DJ'S KIRIN, LUNTY]” which manages to spell out the clave in the negative space amidst a combination tornado/earthquake that will absolutely destroy your house and probably kill your pet. I dare you to listen to this and not walk away with tinnitus.

4. Tooly?: Not Cute

5. Kannii, wolfacejoeyy: Hate Me

6. Chow Lee f. Cash Cobain, Bay Swag: act bad twin!

The next trio is what people who pay closer attention to new music as a going cultural concern, rather than as a quixotic taste experiment, call sexy drill. As far as I can tell, this refers to hypertrap mellowing and modal rap expanding its melodic range somewhat, so you have lots of sing-rap with a bit more melodic color than the oppressive modal haze of 2014-2019, set to beats that are alternately lush and chintzy. Occasionally (but not often enough for my tastes) you get some no-foolin’ beauty.

I’m pleased, from a personal brand perspective, that the two I instinctively pulled from Joshua Minsoo Kim’s sexy drill playlist hit opposite poles of YouTube popularity: Tooly? with 40 views and Kanii & wolfacejoeyy with 300,000. I also found some kinda-sorta sexy drill on my own this week (I think? I still don’t have a great intuitive handle on the sound) that features Cash Cobain, a major player in the subgenre whose music I’ve never quite clicked with. This song is much closer to modal rap melodically than the other two selections, though the chord progression doesn’t really resolve to major or minor, making it seems a little prettier and less oppressive.

7. Muney23, Glorygirl2950: #untitled

I suppose the cover art is attempting to suggest sexy and drill, but as far as I can tell this is not sexy drill, but rather another glitchy avant-rap featuring Glorygirl2950.

8. Shogu Tokumaru: Frogs & Toads

A blast from the past — I don’t think I’ve thought about Shogu Tokumaru in twenty years! I remember him doing indie-approved electro-acoustic folk-pop music with a mildly experimental bent, but more often than not a beat you can tap along to, and he seems to have kept it up fairly consistently since then.

9. AKRIILA: para siempre (｡ᐳ﹏ᐸ)

Landfill hyperpop from Colombia. I seem to love all of this long-tail stuff better than hyperpop proper. It needed global absorption and a sense of being totally played out to reach its true potential.

10. ARTMS: Virtual Angel

One I discovered from a really interesting newsletter on idol culture from Caity Summer and a post on rebooted LOONA group ARTMS. That was where I found the original “not for human eyes” version of the video for this song. I didn’t embed that version — content warning for various visual triggers, strobing, etc. — but it’s this one, and it is an extremely good video, maybe the best video I’ve seen all year. The editor is so aggressive they cut it to eighth notes, like watching a flicker film projected in Times Square.

Wanted to excerpt some of Caity’s thoughts at length:

“Virtual Angel” is a chaotic, arresting depiction of celebrity worship made literal, but it’s also a compelling indictment of fan communities, where the enticing tug of vertigo and its attendant danger is a taste everyone indulges. The devout are portrayed as pierced, tattooed punks, a typical analog for outcasts and people on the fringes of society, but here, the markings are all for ARTMS — etched across their arms, backs, and faces. Their devotion paints symbols on their skin, makes them visible in the one context that matters. Congregating in a pink cocoon of TV screens, clad in costume angel wings and VR headsets, they wear their love on their bodies.

In their orbit is a plain young girl in a school uniform who shyly hides behind a camcorder, recording their every move but rarely taking part. Her clean-cut appearance and meek demeanor, relegated to the sidelines of their gatherings, instantly demarcates a hierarchy: those committed enough to brand themselves (have a little seven in their display name) and those who will only ever consume what the real fans provide. At times, they embrace her, smiling and laughing. Other times, they take baseball bats to a car where she sits petrified, still smiling, still laughing.

Fan spaces are claustrophobic and treacherous, a lifeline and a death wish by turns, tenuous friendships forged on the basis that you all look not at each other but at the same star in the sky. You follow strangers no different from your idol for updates on your idol and toe all their careful lines. What does that make them to you?

11. daxxxa: Темнота

12. Nesamovyta: Не Забереш

Two from Ukraine. The first is standard “down on the dancefloor” (yes I still trot out phrases I came up with in 2007!) confessional electro, and the second the only time I’ve heard Ukrainian pop try to approximate something like an Afrobeats rhythm, though it ultimately chickens out and shifts into more run-of-the-mill dance-pop.

13. Cheyada: ยามราตรี

14. POOKAN: รู้ได้ไงว่าคนที่เดินออกมานั้นไม่เจ็บ

Two from Thailand, the first some wispy indie-pop that should give American indie acts a run for their money, the second a K-pop-ish ballad that should not give Korean pop acts a run for their money.

15. Profeta Yao Yao, Smi-Lee, Michael G f. Alexito Mix: Hocico Caliente

Mexican reggaeton that isn’t scared to use much cornier sounds than I usually hear — the guy sounds like a dork, not a social category I come across often in this genre, or maybe I just don’t notice the dorks when I hear them.

16. Mark With a K, Regi: Cambodia

A more clear-cut dork: Belgian DJ who specializes in the sorts of crass EDM remixes of popular songs that back in 2019 I was fond of referring to as bort-pop, after Edward Oculicz’s coinage in the Singles Jukebox. Those songs excavated old popular songs and replaced their choruses with ground-up syllables from the wreckage of what used to be their vocal hooks, like sampling an all-time melody line in a Casio SK-1 and then just turning it into the demo music. This song is arguably even stupider than bort, but in a way that feels stupid on purpose — it nearly achieves Scooter but can’t go far enough over the top.

17. DJ Lycox: They Not Like Us Rmx

I’ve avoided commenting on “Not Like Us” — I found the whole Drake/Kendrick saga incredibly boring and didn’t particularly like any of the songs. But just through ambient exposure I do know “Not Like Us” pretty well, so I appreciated a bonkers slice ‘n’ dice remix from DJ Lycox that keeps my two favorite parts — the chorus and the sarcastic “step this way, step that way.”

18. Lil’B: Biss ça là-bas

19. Toofan: Gweta [2014]

20. Team Décalé: Ambiance

Three songs that came from a new Francophone African playlist with an emphasis on Côte d’Ivoire and biama music (biama is a recent-ish evolution of coupé-décalé in Abdijan related to footwork dance challenges; I haven’t really parsed its sonic distinctions yet.) Need to be a bit careful with this list, as it throws out some old songs, like Togo group Toofan’s hit from 2014, “Gweta,” which was too good to remove. Otherwise two strong biama/coupé-décalé tracks from Côte d’Ivoire by Lil’B (no, the other one) and Team Décalé.

21. PANICIAN: Borderland

More Thai bands giving American indie and post-punk a run for its money, this time Bangkok group PANICIAN with some gothic, not to say goth per se, drone-rock.

22. Jessica Boudreaux: Suffering

The solo singer-songwriter turn from the lead of the band Summer Cannibals on Kill Rock Stars. This song won me over with its line about making a sandwich to avoid succumbing to despair, though it doesn’t really develop too far beyond that idea. (But sometimes if you have a good idea you don’t need to develop it further than that.)

23. Skye Wanda: Feela

Not amaapiano/R&B crossover, per se, but definitely a poppier take on amapiano from a South African singer.

24. Kabza De Small f. Young Stunna, Nkosazana Daughter, Mthunzi, Nokwazi, Anzo, Mashudu, Murumba Pitch, Tman Xpress: Kabza Chant

And finally, after several months, I have 15 minutes to spare for an extremely long amapiano masterpiece from Kabza De Small. Amapiano has been holding its own this year, but it seems like the ground has been shifting — this is basically Kabza De Small’s 3-step epic, bringing on tons of prominent collaborators for something that might be a swan song, a victory lap, or a headlong rush into an unknown future. Time will tell.

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That’s it! Until next week, don’t get so busy listening to Christian rock music from the 1970s that you forget to eat.

—Dave Moore (the other one)

Title from Jessica Boudreaux’s “Suffering”