Flower Boy: On Hip Hop and Homophobia
Tyler, the Creator’s latest album, Flower Boy may well be the first genuine coming-out album in hip-hop. Of course, there have been precursors in recent years, most notably [...]
Music
Brian Eno: Reflection (2017)
Throughout the 2010s there has been something of a renaissance in Brian Eno’s body of work. Granted, we live in an age of comebacks, revivals and reformations, but that’s [...]
Leonard Cohen: You Want It Darker (2016)
With George Michael passing away on Boxing Day, it feels as if 2016 has been indelibly marked as the end of a musical era. Between them, Leonard Cohen, George Michael, Prince [...]
A Tribe Called Quest: “The Space Program” (2016)
I love the sound and style of hip-hop, but go through long periods without listening to a lot of hip-hop. In large part, that’s because its pervasive misogyny and [...]
Frank Ocean: On the Eve of Blond
With Frank Ocean’s third album set to hit the stores this week and available to stream in its entirety on selected sites, I’ve been pondering what makes the media [...]
Beyonce: “Formation” (2016) & Holmer: The Fits (2016)
Even though white people no longer make up the majority of the population in vast areas of America, the white body – and the white male body – is still presented by the [...]
The Life of Pablo: Notes on Yeezy
It might seem strange to put up a review of The Life of Pablo before the album has even been released. At the same time, it feels as if Kanye is striving to turn the [...]
David Bowie: Blackstar (2016)
When I first heard that David Bowie had died, I was in a plane over the Pacific Ocean, stricken by an extreme bout of food poisoning. Delirious, I clambered onto United Wi-Fi [...]
Drake: “Hotline Bling” (2015)
How does quiet storm look in the second decade of the new millennium? That’s one of the questions posed by the music video for Drake’s latest single, which has to be one [...]
New Order: Music Complete (2015)
What does it mean to create a New Order album without Peter Hook? That’s the question raised by Music Complete, the band’s first album of original material since 2013’s [...]