mwah mwah mwah, it's the Cooly G thread

love her new album, but cant get into her as a singer. and that eroto-nocturnal-dreamy vibe shes going for is a little too transparent, i find it tough to really buy into it. i want to hear someone else sing her parts. musically though, its amazing.

i really like it with a touch of the same reservations but at some point in the album it stops mattering, i feel like few others could sing as casually as she does

I didn't know she had a new one out! I feel so out of touch...

it's out next month - idk if it's leaked or not (or even if there's been an advance single)

it's way different to the first

the final track is the one that brings it all into devastating focus for me

cool, I liked the first album but a switch-up was definitely in order

The first album was fantastic for setting up a very specific mood and working through it in every conceivable direction. So I'm glad that the next album sounds like it does the same thing for a different palette?

i think the palette isn't what's different so much as which bits of it are foregrounded. the voice, obv...the twigs-like sexuality (though she's never aloof like twigs, this is a very earthy-sounding album, and it's all everyday rather than ~mystical)

"i feel like few others could sing as casually as she does"

thats exactly the issue for me, though at the same time, and maybe this contradicts what im saying, but theres also this air of distance, of haughtiness, of never really letting her guard down.

shes also just plain flat IMO but ive not let that get in the way of my enjoyment of other singers so i should probably leave that one alone.

i think where cooly g really works for me is that whatever initial reservations i have, i can't actually imagine these songs being performed differently let alone better

I dunno, I haven't heard the new one, but that whole "dancing around the notes" thing she did on the first one struck me as deliberate usage of blue notes and complex harmonic structures, rather than "just plain flat" but I can see how that could be an acquired taste.

lead single (and album opener):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmq47ciNuSk

love it.

i'm not always into what she does but i love this. pretty interested in hearing the album now.

OK, if the whole album is like that, I'm pretty excited to hear it!

She is the best! <3

http://www.thefader.com/2014/10/28/beat-construction-cooly-g-interview?&_suid=141450947429406409275101032108

i'm liking the album

I still don't have the album* but I'm liking all the tracks I've heard off it.

*when I get a job, I will buy one album as reward, and this is the album I will buy.

interesting to hear background behind "phat si" in that interview, still one of my favorite tracks of hers

love her <3

on first listen, even more low-key and sparse than the last one. could do with a bit more variety.

There's a strange kind of... anti-lyricism to her lyrics, a kind of casual matter-of-factness that sits awkwardly with the sensuality of the sonics. Obviously this is how real people crack onto each other all the time but the record itself is a good illustration of why a bit of pretension is often necessary.

that disjoint is prob one of my favourite things about cooly g, generally

i kind of feel her sonix are as casual as her lyrics, there's a tossed-off and spontaneous feel to them even when they sound sensuous or complex

(sometimes this is frustrating bc if she really focused or cared about songcraft maybe she could make a truly great album rather than just an extremely beguiling one? but she does her so it's still good)

Yeah I'm kind of at a loss to work out what's missing here, I'm not sure it's necessarily effort but maybe just that ear for melodic and rhythmic hooks that really great producers/songwriters in this vein usually have?

I feel like this record is sort of endlessly riffing on Aaliyah's Beats 4 Da Streets (Intro) as a template.

That said, I've listened to it all the way through like 5 times and enjoyed it, but couldn't name a single track if you asked me!

i do like this album a lot, it does have a really good atmosphere to it, and the last song might be the best thing shes done, but there is something just a bit off about it, i cant ever stop being aware of there being a certain lack in her voice, its not even that its not 'good', its that there is a real lack of feeling in it. i put that down to her range, but its just a lack of expressiveness. she sounds like shes posing the whole time. and it might be that there arent enough hooks/songs - i think there are enough personally - but its all delivered too much a 'too cool to be arsed' kind of vibe.

Great interview in the Quietus: http://thequietus.com/articles/16466-cooly-g-interview

Sorta confirms the album was, if not tossed-off, then at least rushed a bit to get done under Kode9's (arbitrary?) deadline. It doesn't really click for me, much prefer her track on Hyperdub's otherwise crap r&b comp this year. Called 'Obsessed' and an update of 'Dis Boy': http://www.beatport.com/track/obsessed-original-mix/5538317#

great track:
https://soundcloud.com/hyperdub/trippin-b/s-tStvH