REVIEW: KATIE - OUR TIME IS BLUE EP

4/5

Blue Seoul. 

Times like these have been hard in 2020. Echo that. But going 'Blue' like Joni Mitchell, our KATIE-in a year dominated once again by the 'Dynamite' of BTS (who could just 'Be' and break streaming records) and South Korean sister act BLACKPINK (always needs to be shouted in their signature style of call and response) with their Netflix movie and 'The Album'-shows that K Pop is more than just their two top tier acts like Twice or the haze of Heize the deeper it gets. The Far East nation dominating this still in quarantine revolving world of entertainment, taking the lead from Hollywood, even to those trumped up idiots who think it's just a 'Parasite'. Get the big picture like you missed the best game and name changing one. There's nothing foreign or lost in translation about kids in the West singing along in Korean like Beatlemania in reverse or the world getting beautifully smaller and closer even at an isolated social distance. Oh and those people that didn't show up at your rally Donald?! You can thank the ARMY for that. The only time going to war and trolling does some good. Swashbuckling in a Brooklyn subway, guerilla live performance in the New York City King Kong, thumped his chest and owned. Remembering that duet with Ty Dolla $ign and the dolphin like, echoing beat. We're still thinking about that like zoning at 4am in the morning to 'Thinkin About You' or the one that middle of the night neon vibe atmospherically reminds us of (I'll never tell). Or those great Khalid ('Talk'), Lil Nas X ('Old Town Road') and Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello ('Senorita) reworked covers we wish were still on Spotify like we wish that service would pay its artist more, forget an end of the year wrap (that's how you really say thanks conglomerates). The singing idol and K-Pop Star 4 contest winner has already logged an incredible EP with last year's 'LOG', featuring soulful songs like 'Future Love', 'Love Kills' and the incredible 'Instructions' that you need to follow like her playlist page or a Jermaine Dupri one. But now after the science fiction 'Echo' of an incredibly cinematic classic hit single in April for an artist who like her Korean genre takes pop even deeper than its polished production with actual movies instead of music videos for its actual poetry and not just songs, Katie gets even deeper and darker in a soulful stride into the personal. Especially for the epidemic levels of suicide levelling South Korea, the Far East and the wide world in solitary confinement right now. 'Our Time Is Blue' and her time is now. 

Ghost In The Shell (original...we love you Scarlett and Netflix's computer animated '2049', but this is where it's at) plugged into some anime amazing artwork, Katie Kim (who dropped the last name to become a Google search nightmare like fellow R&B singer Joe, but All CAPS worthy of carrying that common name all by herself) strokes some soulful resonance for your radiating speakers. Even track-by-track, hot take offering more inspired insight on Instagram, storytelling how each song on her most personal project yet came to be. 'Classic' which is exactly that to its name was inspired by neo soul star Jill Scott and her 'Long Walk' as Katie herself made her way to the Subway, headphones on like "do you want it on you collard greens". As this neo K Pop (is she that or have we just coined that?) says this 'Classic' takes her back to her college days for the yearbook. Singing, "picture us Sonny and Cher/your hands in my hair" like it's in his kiss for this Polaroid moment whilst you put your hands in the air. As in a snapshot Kim tells us her young adult upbringing was surrounded by R&B, jazz and soul music. Imagining she'd be making this type of "ear music" years later that she really is. "Taking it back to the classic one time." On the lead single to 'Our Time Is Blue', 'Our Time' KATIE pulls up on the streetlight on a blue anime street surrounded by her billboards for a track that is inspired by movies and books that talk about our love like Brandy and Kanye. "Reminiscing on our time" for an ear candy chorus as smooth and sweet as walking the street, hand-in-hand, to the touch of skin. "Trying to find the magic in the moments" with Leven Kali for the other half of this EP's title track, 'Blue', K tries to "find what's more important" for these clubbed Saturdays and church Sunday's, "Neon lights or coffee in the morning". Compelling classic Dolla $ign affording chemistry with Kali that you could just taste it as he speaks on it, "show me all your colours your an artist". That's 'Blue' for you. A track this singer cherishes so much it makes her want to cry, "from the moment the guitar starts arpeggiating". Alone in the zone in LA in colours of orange, pink, purple and of course...ocean blue. 

Plugged into what's real on the 'Faux' of a leather strong track, the Korean Kim goes genuinely hard on a situation with a record label that reveals just how shallow they are, as artists barely treading water in where they deserve to be spiritually and financially search for new depths to their character and craft. "I trip on my trust/A bit of a mess/My worst and best/Yeah you caught it/But if you know me/I'm more than you see/So somber and sweet if I'm honest". Offering more vision behind "the chrome on your sunglasses" she asks, "tell me what you see, when you look at me"...the future and right now not in the rearview like the radio of her 'Love Kills' Lo-Fi remix lyric video for the singer who recorded some of this extended play quarantined in her parents car. This is my kind of blue Miles. Tune into more behind why everything fell through on this deal right before the ink dried on the paperwork for a world that needs to be handshake stronger than oak, but right now sanitizes anything that comes close. For the record we should only keep a distance physically and only wear masks that protect us from corona, not mental ones that hide a villain behind what we really see. "They were looking for a K-Pop artist and I wasn't really K-Pop" the K soul star (by jove I think we've got it) says in a "don't judge me on preconceived notions and don't try to make me into who you think I am" (amen...Korean music is more than K Pop and we were sorry to paint you with the same brush. We will leave our mistake and apology in here for posterity) before she helps 'Teach A Man' like Haim's 'Man From The Magazine' c### on a track that she says isn't quite like her classics 'Thinkin' Bout You' or 'Remember', but is just as sassy and vulnerable. And in this honest 'Women In Music' year of big guns like a 'Chromatica' Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus last week and Taylor Swift surprise releases of 'Folklore'. And of course the greatest record of these terrible 12 months in the Valley Girls and sisters 'Part III'. What's great records from greats like Norah Jones (her solo 'Pick Me Up' and Puss N Boots supergroup), Alicia Keys ('Alica' to go with the autobiography), Lianne La Havas ('Lianne La Havas') without this? All 'Punisher' Phoebe Bridgers has done from 'Kyoto' and all 'Iris' Goo Goo Dolls cover co-singer, Maggie Rogers is about to do with her 'Past Life', 'Notes From The Archives' this month. And of course here in Japan, Aimyon and South Korea's own Blackpink ("BLACKPINK!"). In all of this, what's a year of the power or women in music without its future like, "ready for a change of mind" for "somebody to give me a vibe"? "I could write a book/I could write a poem/If you want to read it/Baby there's no harm/I might ring you up just to see if you're around/'cause lately I've been stuck with my thoughts inside the house" she 'Lullaby' sings to us tonight on the blue evenings classic closer on what she says is a "super soothing" 'Rockabye Baby'. Now what could be more comfortable in a year most vulnerable? One we need one time in our year of blue. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Playlist Picks: 'Our Time', 'Blue (Feat. Leven Kali)', 'Faux'. 

REVIEW: THE SMASHING PUMPKINS - CYR

 

4/5

Twenty-Twenty and the Infinite Sadness.

Zeroes! Wanna go for a ride? Halloween may be over like Thanksgiving in the fall of the most tragic year, but the Pumpkins are back with spice, ready to smash mouths like lattes this season at Starbucks. All with the 'CYR' of some album artwork you'd kind of find in New York's Rockefeller building with a striking God like figure in all its promethean, muscular glow looking like Dr. Manhattan himself. The same blue man group hero their 'The End Is The Beginning Is The End' classic track epically introduced in the trailer for Zack Snyder's 2009 'Watchmen' graphic novel of a movie after the 'Batman and Robin' soundtrack song deserved to score better. The Smashing Pumpkins aren't the type of band that need to spread one track thin over two movies though. They have more hits than the page that checks the cases this year. With more line-ups then LeBron James and the Californian champion, Los Angeles Lakers. But here's 3 of 4 D'Arcy. Even if it has felt like '1979' since their last album. It hasn't. It just everything feels 30 years ago, quarantined in lockdown right now. Think of this new album 'CYR' as a companion piece to the 2018 Rick Rubin produced tenth album, 'Shiny and Oh So Bright, Vol. 1 / LP: No Past. No Future. No Sun.' With its similar strokes of artwork, coming after 2012's outstanding 'Oceania' and the 2014 momumental 'Monuments To An Elegy'. Their last Hollywood heavy metal album being the 2007 idea of the Statue of Liberty and Paris Hilton covering, 'Zeitgeist' which even had greatest hit single worthy b-sides ('Death From Above') to their 'That's The Way (My Love Goes)' and 'Bleeding The Orchid' super singles. Back when histories spirit and mood was a little brighter and not actually that conspiratory...well, not like it is now anyway. Lady Liberty now 'Cloverfield' green (that was my choice of album colour shade) looking like something out of Kurt Russell's 'Escape From New York' this Christmas chronicle...or a Paris reality show. And let's not forget their biggest records off some of their signature sets 'Today'. Like the 'Quiet', 'Soma', 'Rocket' 'Disarm' off a iconic 'Siamese Dream'. To 'Tonight, Tonight', 'Jellybelly', 'Here Is No Why', 'Bullet With Butterfly Wings', 'To Forgive', 'Love', 'Muzzle', 'Bodies', 'Thirty-Three', 'In The Arms Of Sleep', 'We Only Come Out At Night', 'Beautiful', 'By Starlight' everything off the 'Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness' double disc classic that plays like a greatest hits from dawn to dusk and twilight to starlight. The only album in had back in those Sony Discman college CD changing (disc two was my other choice) days...and the only one I needed. Not the only Smashing Pumpkins album, but the ONLY album I had. Welcome to life before Spotify streaming and cherry picking kids! Now I'm talking to my generation in baggy blue jeans and chains nostalgia...feel old yet? And how about the 'Widow Wake My Mind', star 'Spangled', 'Astral Planes' of the 'Teargarden By Kaleidyscope' web series they gave their fans for f###### free like a Timbaland Thursday or Kanye G.O.O.D. Friday (remember that time?) when fans fickly said they were done? Now with 21 tracks as atmospherically neon smooth as 'TheFutureEmbrace' of a criminally underrated Billy Corgan solo album for your 1 hour and 12 minutes. So much so 10 of these albums tracks came as singles before last weeks release. That's what happens when you whittle the track list down from an epic 35 count (we'd have taken all of them) as Jimmy Chamberlain says. When it comes to us and Smashing songs we 'Adore'. We shall never be apart. 

Untouchable. You should still take this golden era band seriously in their Springsteen years, still able to write a 'Letter To You' under these 'Western Stars' this year and the last ones. Even if the same Corgan who once without taking his eyes off his mark, Capone threatened a stage bum rushing fan with violence, has been seen on the cover of dog magazines, smiling with puppies (amazing). Or if better than a classic 'Simpsons' joke, the internet took his "weeee don't even care" from '1979' and turned it into a roller-coaster reaction Vine, Tik Tok, or whatever the f### it's called, more hilarious than the one down with whatever those noises Lady Gaga made when she was close to the epic end of 'Shallow' from her 'A Star Is Born' Hollywood remake with Bradley Cooper. Far from done and quarantined from Rubin's Hollywood Hills production home, Corgan produces this one perfectly. Featuring soulful backing vocals for their middle of the night tones from touring members Sierra Swan and Katie Cole that gives this synth pop, prog rock a 70's feel to the future. Now how about those top ten tracks? Released back-to-back, taking it back to those B-Side nostalgic days, but still mostly serving double A's like Duracell. This band will never Energizer bunny run out of records now. Like the title track and 'The Colour Of Love', kaleidoscope bright as the wheel turns and Corgan sings, "whomever wants you alone/whomever wants you atones/it's with this prayer I've sewn/whomever wants you alone," about this, "vast amount of the time slipped away." This and the storytelling 'Ashes' of 'Confessions Of A Dopamine Addict' came with the 'In Ashes' animated short that served as more than music videos, but more Hollywood for their lyrical screenplays. This all came to a pre-COVID, next third episode of 'Ashes' and the double single release of 'Anno Satana' and 'Birch Grove'. All before the flowers for 'Ramona' and the Friday the 13th, lucky for some fans special edition video of 'Wyttch' that furnished the Pumkins' Halloween like Carpenter. Then came the 'Purple Blood' like the Lakers King and the 'Dulcet In E' as Corgan gets classically compelling with his couplets, “from a tree swings an apple/a pear or a candle/and once caught/Captive of your love.”  Heavy metal poetry. 

Rhyming on 'Starrcraft' and then 'Save Your Tears', Billy let's the pain rain from ducts like aqua as he says, "swoon/Swoon in spirals phased/Swoon in chorused grays/Won't you go?/Won't you freeze?/Please although/You're asked to still/Swoon in somber haze/Swoon by haste," in a new classic chorus. But then how about the chorus of 'Telegenix', taking mental health to task as we all work on ourselves, trapped with out demons at home, scratching the door like a monster under the bed as we sleep? "Then I will bet on your life/From sodden vale and hell's divide/That wind says rain/As blossoms fell for live TV/The ghosts we slay come ours to reap/Upending what's land's end/If they say it's not suicide, then what is/At the bottom of a boot black sea?" If you thought you were drowning, adrift in this sea alone then think again. Here's a hand. Like the one he lends, leading you through the 'Black Forest, Black Hills' for the darkest year for mankind since the great depression or the black plague. Knowing somehow we will make it together. As long as we have the 'Adrennalyne' like this shot to the speakers, or more personal headphones. Echoing through these chambers to Chamberlain, nothing is as haunting as 'Haunted' this season, howling at the moon for a real thriller. This really could be chapter and verse in harrowing harmony as Corgan chimes, "Along the banks of rivers Zion/Sang a fallen and forsworn/The chain/Of human rage/And let between an ocean rain/And lambs so led, I stayed." But still they aren't done like, 'The Hidden Sun'. Then on 'Schaudenfreud' Corgan mentally takes apart anyone who drives pleasure from anothers misfortune with Sigmund Freud smarts. All before growling over guitar to the stripes of 'Tyger, Tyger' and the majestic, 'Minerva' closer. Ending on a high for us saints and feints marching in, singing, "So kinetic, electric waterloo/In vitro, in shadow Xanadu/Perfumed papers that say that we'll mend/Let's dance around again/Let's dance around again." Sometimes fools win...but not you Trump. Our carriage may have turned into a pumpkin this year, but once we rocked the vote it was record breaking smashing. And here's one Pumpkin that won't rot later when it's brought to your porch. Even if the world has gone to a heavy, Halloween horror, handbasket hell. At least we have the metal. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Playlist Picks: 'The Colour Of Love', 'Confessions Of A Dopamine Addict', 'Minerva'. 

REVIEW: MILEY CYRUS - PLASTIC HEARTS

4/5

Cyrus vs the Virus

Double plastic like Dolly. That's what artists albums go these days with the surge of Spotify and streaming. But not Miley. She can go a little bit country ('Younger Now' in 2017). Or you know, a little bit rock-n-roll. Moving millions like units. Pink punking out in a Sex Pistols cropped top that if it was on a dude that said "never mind" to jeans would end up revealing the bollocks. She's the dogs. But back on the dance floor in this age of 'Plastic Hearts', Billy Ray's kid is back to her 'Bangerz' best, whilst everyone else is still twerking in the club. The former Disney Princess, Cyrus can't be tamed like ten years ago. 'She Is Coming' again too, back like last years EP and one of the biggest and best songs of not only her career, but pop as a whole. What more could you expect from this 'Mothers Daughter' who made it because she was always told she would and can Charlie around with Ariana Grande and Lana Del Rey like 'Don't Call Me Angel' and still go ten rounds in the ring with both? Licking at their heels like she does Miss 'Thank U Next's' cheek. Following Grande's grand surprise album and whenever we'll see 'Chemtrails Over The Country Club' from the Del Rey, gangster Nancy Sinatra (does that make Miley a gangster Madonna?), Queen of Staten Island's new home in the Hollywood Hills. Back up, back up, back up back up boy like a brother of Thor. You can't f### with her freedom corona. She came to get her some as she sings 'Gimme What I Want'. Following her most introspective, inspired single like reflection of bottles in the swimming pool ('Slide Away') after telling us with Mark Ronson, 'Nothing Breaks Like A Heart', the biggest alternative pop star is back with her first full length in three. No longer a 'Prisoner' as she uncages a dynamic duet of the same name with the biggest breakout pop star of the last few years, Dua Lipa, before Plastic Ono owning these hearts and bringing legends from Billy Idol ("no way") to the Queen of Fleetwood Mac along for this Gambit ride. Forget the rumors, there's never a dull moment with Miley under the neon of this 'Midnight Sky'. Work Miley, Miley. Work. 

Wrecking balls wreak havoc on everything. Even COVID-19 in 2020, as this has been the year to fight like a girl again with these 'Women In Music' like the 'Part III' of Haim's greatest, Grammy nominated record and our album of the year for sure. This is a calendar that has seen more collections from Norah Jones than her last half decade, or even generational great of this one Phoebe Bridgers' work like a 'Punisher'. A 'Copycat Killer' EP new version of her own Grammy family nominated album came out last week, not to mention a Christmas cover that proceed benefits homeless women looking for shelter. And we haven't even begun to talk about her vote rocking campaign downloading cover of 'Iris' by the Goo Goo Dolls with the one and only Maggie Rogers. The 'Alaska' singer who had the best album of last year right out of the January gates of you 'Heard It In A Past Life' (with all due respect to the 'Cheap Queen' runner up of King Princess who already has a a sick, second album, sophomore single with 'Only Time Makes It Human') and will close out this one with some 'Notes From The Archives' B-sides and rarities (oh, please let us see 'James' again Maggie). Quarantined in a space like isolation, Lady Gaga, a star reborn took us out of this world and back to the dance floor with 'Chromatica'. Best Coast returned for some California love like a hotel on the Hollywood hills telling us in this year of despair that there's 'Always Tomorrow'. Taylor Swift took it back to her roots, locking down 'Folklore' at a a social distance. Whilst 'Lianne La Havas' and 'Alicia' Keys got even more personal with their beautiful, self-titled namesake albums. All this and more with J-Pop singer Aimyon and South Korea's Blackpink taking over the world like BTS with their album. And we're still yet to hear the 'Echo' from the new EP from KATIE coming next week for 'Our Time Is Blue'. Even Aussie Jezabel Hayley Mary went solo for her 'Piss and Perfume' extended play. But pissing on all the competition with her own scent is Miley Cyrus marking her own territory and pop style that grunges genre together like Cobain and Courtney were still in a Hole of Nirvana. 

Prisoners you only have to see it in the new video with Dua Lipa for an underground, quarantined party that goes dirtier than Christina Aguilera and Redman smashing something. Determined to get you moving even in sweatpants as Dua and Miley both sing together, "Strung out on a feeling, my hands are tied/Your face on my ceiling, I fantasize/Oh, I can't control it, I can't control it (I can't control it)/I try to replace it with city lights/I'll never escape it, I need the high/Oh, I can't control it, I can't control it (Oh)" in a time were longing for neon, we're just saying "hello walls" like Willie Nelson. Still, it's the stunning single, 'Midnight Sky' that's really evocative disco pop. Yearning for the American lights of Springsteen singing, "I was born to run, I don't belong to anyone, oh no/I don't need to be loved by you (By you)/Fire in my lungs, can't bite the devil on my tongue, oh no/I don't need to be loved by you/See my lips on her mouth, everybody's talkin' now, baby." In that same neon vain, there's amazingly atmospheric tracks like the tears of, 'Angels Like You', storming Los Angeles like circling the drain of a bar tab. Or the classic couplets breaking up on 'Never Be Me', before she takes us top of the city 'High' with her studio chronic for her ashtrays and heartbreaks like her duet with Snoop Dogg back on that one day he called himself Lion. Then as she says, "Go ahead, you can say it's my fault/If it still hurts at all/I thought one of these days you might call/When you were feelin' small" on 'Hate Me' she takes to task the haters or anyone that doesn't know hot to mind their business to all the gratuitous gossip. But it's the 'Golden G String' that's really the diamond as she primal scream sings, "There are layers to this body/Primal sex and primal shame/They told me I should cover it/So I went the other way/I was tryin' to own my power/Still I'm tryin' to work it out/And at least it gives the paper somethin' they can write about." Aiming for something higher than the spotlight of headlines. 10 million and change. Bringing out the big guns in this time of hearts made of plastic and glass, she pistol whips with Billy Idol, 'Night Crawling' like Jake Gyllenhaal stalking a Steel Panther in Hollywood. All before having 'Bad Karma' but a classic collab with Joan Jett and The Blackhearts, as this young idol more than a Hot Topic t-shirt, knows the greats like she knows how to party. 'WTF Do I Know' she asks on the outstanding opener of this pure pop album that's f###### fun. Apparently...everything. Especially when it comes to making and taking inspiration from great music. Even the 'Plastic Hearts' title track is a platinum smash, gold standard record. Now if this Sex Pistol rocking with punk idols like Billy wasn't enough, then just wait until the 'Edge Of Midnight' and Fleetwood's Stevie Nicks remixes her 'Midnight Sky' like a brand new day. All before Miley herself takes it back to the golden 80's to 90's, rocking covers of classics live with love for a set we miss. Gigging greats from The Cranberries 'Zombie' in her head, paying tribute to the late Dolores O'Riordan, to a Blonde 'Heart Of Glass', rocking like Debbie Harry. Blonde on blonde this artist is as real and raw as it gets. Plastic fantastic. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

Playlist Picks : 'Prisoner (Feat. Dua Lipa)', 'Midnight Sky', 'Angels Like You'. 

REVIEW: BTS - BE

 4/5

BE-TS

Exploding like 'Dynamite' just when you thought they couldn't blow up anymore, the only thing that breaks more records than BTS is the Guinness Book. Streaming into the multi-millions on Spotify and YouTube. Even with South Korean sister act Blackpink (there's room for both Big Hits and YG's) in your area with 'The Album' and the movie, 'Light Up The Sky' on Netflix, these boys still burn the stage, despite their worldwide sold out tour being locked and shut down due to coronavirus' quarantine. They still move millions like donating that much to the Black Lives Matter movement and then having their ARMY of fans up the ante by raising and matching that million dollar pledge, all whilst shutting down any racist troll that came Twitter or social media's way with anything to say that didn't support George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and every black person's life that matters today, yesterday and tomorrow, forever more. BTS are no stranger to movements, telling everyone to 'Love Yourself' and making us all idols in the process. Giving love and hope to a world in depression and the epidemic rates of suicide, especially in the Far East and South Korea. This groups dynamic helped save my life...as the kids say FACTS! Showing matter and pride in your race in what is no longer and never really was a white man's world. Especially in a time were Hollywood and the great American songbook no longer rules the entertainment planet like it once did. You only have to look at this year's Academy Award acclaimed Best Picture and foreign film category changing, script flipper and game changer, Bong Joon-ho's 'Parasite', Oscar. Or just what the Bangtan boys and "BLACKPINK" are doing to music and foreign fans in the one direction of the West singing along in Korean, akin to Beatlemania for the cute ones like an Ed Sullivan bowl-cut and tailored tribute on Colbert. Put those two fingers together everybody. South Korea rules and these are the spokesmen. Covering TIME magazine and speaking at the United Nations like not only the world, but the generation we're talking about is theirs. 

2020 has been the worst. Welcome to the understatement of the year. It's been tragic when it should have roared old sport. From losing the Black Mamba and Mambacita, to the Black Panther. And then being infected with COVID-19 and police brutality. But we as a people, brothers and sisters, united in solidarity together have shown fight and togetherness in this struggle. Like voting Trump out and bringing Obama's hope back and doing all we can to still stay embraced at an arms length social distance. Or how we can find ourselves and a new way to work, Zooming across the world from the comfort of our living room and sweatpants, staying as safe as houses at home which we should still do if we can, when we're not taking to the streets in face masks and sanitizer. BTS have had quite the calender too. That is also quite the understatement, but during these times the most respectful one. Back in February they were 'On' with an ARMY 'Louder Than Bombs' with their seventh seal and a road map that looked to pave the way for an epic year of entertainment to set off the new roaring twenties, 'Map Of The Soul' like a boy with luv for the biggest boy band ever from these in sync backstreets that have fans from everyone from Halsey to McConaughey (and me). Spreading their wings like a Natalie Portman 'Black Swan' in a year that has seen studio success for artists going back to the drawing board with their strokes, from Taylor Swift's 'Folklore' wilderness roots to the 'pink 'Sour Candy' of Gaga's out of this world planet 'Chromatica', despite cinemas being closed and sports shut down until they bubbled like we'll never shut up and dribble. "Jump up to the top LeBron" as these young Kings take the throne like James Lakers gang or a Colman crown on Netflix with a young dirty Diana dancing like an M.J. not named Jordan in this last dance. Hot off the heels off this 'Map', Suga took it back to his D-2 rap roots with his own alter-ego album like a Rap Monster 'Mono' mixtape of 'Forever Rain', or a J-Hope 'Chicken Noodle Soup' with Becky G and a soda on the side and shrine to all that and Korean culture video, 'Daechwita'...which still remains the banger of the year and these boys collective career. Even with all this 'Dynamite'. 

Now as we just 'BE' to end this year we want to see the back of like watching her walk away, BTS release their latest 8-track in a year were they stayed gold with another big single and a Japanese version of 'Map Of The Soul: 7' for their Far East neighbours who think Twice when it comes to choosing Spotify streams over the Tower Records of actual albums (salute!). Sharing the name with the 'Let Love' amazing artist and Coltrane of hip-hop Common's classic and conscious genre game changing album, this soulful affair is set to bring the love back in a time of hate too for part two to their own beautiful revolution, televised and smartphone vlogged. Consider this a victory lap in what should have been an Olympic year for these idols with love who released their biggest hit and first English language single with 'Dynamite' that is blowing up so much, so many people who used to fail to understand are now lacing their boots for the army. Stranger things have happened. Just like the 80's fairground like America's Got Talent live performance that saw Junkook pass the mic to a roof rocking RM ("ladies and gentlemen I got the medicine, so you should keep your eyes on the ball"...now how do you like that?) who passed it back to a gas station dancing J-Hope in a red shirt, classic Coca Cola Americana in this firework carnival of choreography step and note perfect. In what would have made the perfect music video if it wasn't for the B'pink 'Ice Cream' like pastels of the outstanding official one for their candy coated anthem that stopped fans in their tracks with Tune Squad, 'Space Jam' throwback too even if they were eating donuts. Dunking all over the competition BTS are "rolling on like a Rolling Stone", bigger than King Kong in what's now their Empire State. Diamond glow up. "Dy-na-na-mite" like Chappelle, rocking and dropping mic's on Saturday Night Live. The pop stars still able to rock them like the rapping roots of who they really are. Like the delight of the 'Dis-ease' track they dias with ease and no need for translation like the fun feeling of their 'Skit' that laughs like a Nelly '5000' when 'Pimp Juice' was hot in heeere, welcoming us to 'Nellyville'. Showing us that just going full English for a one off gimmick, this extended play is more than a spark to set 'Dynamite' off, but instead another firecracker of a collection to ass to their classic catalogue. Like the sublime second single 'Life Goes On', as in matching white suits, sitting on stage in black chairs for a black and white movie, music video these boys shows us this band is still on the run, mixing music hallmarks and their own testimony to the tradition. Showing rhyme for rhyme they still have that kinetic 'Telepathy', before the beat goes on and these Bangtan bangers 'Stay' in the club like their dance moves were made for. But 'Fly Me To My Room' as that very track and the beautiful ballad, 'Blue and Grey' may be the pick of these eight wonders like 'Your Eyes Tell', mapping their way home. As getting persona personal they sing, "I don't know where it went wrong/Since my youth, I've had a blue question mark in my head/Maybе that's why I've been living so fiercely/But whеn I look back, I'm all by myself/That hazy shadow that swallows me up/The blue question mark still exists/Is it anxiety or depression?/How am I so regretful?/Or is it just me, one that loneliness gave birth to/I still don't know, the ferocious blue/I hope I don't erode away, I'll find the exit", showing that in the deepest depressions and the most inspired impressions this collective like the whole K-Pop genre know how to take it deeper than bubblegum rhymes, swallow their pride and reveal who they really are behind all they've made up and fashioned in gender and idol fluidity. Fighting the darkest feelings head on. Now if that isn't original and outstanding, I don't know what is. Let's hear it for the biggest influencers who wouldn't even need an Instagram to be double tapped into. "What's good Korea?" These idols are even bigger than Nicki Minaj, or Cardi B rhyming with Blackpink. Now everyone knows what a BTS is like a WAP. Get the Grammy ready. TIM DAVID HARVEY. 

Playlist Picks: 'Dynamite', 'Life Goes On', 'Telepathy'. 

BOOK REVIEW: LENNY KRAVITZ - LET LOVE RULE

 

4/5

Let Words Rule. 

Eluthera, quarantined. Socially isolated at a distance, there's worse places to be locked down in this weary year than the bountiful beauty of the Bahamas and this inspired island. The perfect place to pen your memoirs as Lenny Kravitz's let's his autobiography story by the book rule like love. Quarantined in paradise like stuck in the studio most singers are finding solace in right now in the vision of this terrible 2020 in hindsight, we haven't heard from Kravitz since 2018 when he 'Raised Vibration' with the Eluthera magic hour tide coming in like the night shore of the background, 'Johnny Cash'. Not to mention classic tracks like the drum roll and video for 'Low' which vibrating on another level really took us higher like 'Gold Dust', 'The Majesty Of Love', or 'I'll Always Be Inside Your Soul', because 'Here To Love', 'We Can Get It All Together'. 'It's Enough'. Although we also saw him go all around the world like daft punks can't anymore with the 'Assemblage' of his beautiful black and white Don Perignon perfect portrait collection. Popping bottles with the likes of Harvey Kietel, Susan Sarandon and his own daughter Zoe Kravitz from back home in his New York to here in Harajuku, Tokyo, Japan. He's also been quarantined in the Louvre of all places like French act Christine and the Queens performing this years anthem, 'People, I've Been Sad' Live for James Corden's 'Late Night', in love like Paris with his socially distanced muse for this year's video of 'Vibration's' 'Ride'. Getting a minute with Mona, riding with France in all it's hallmark, traditional beauty that will always stand strong and tall like Notre Dame forever. But are you going to go his way again? As the 'American Woman' and 'Fly Away' singer isn't staying away from you now like the 'It Ain't Over' Till It's Over' of 'Stand By My Woman' no matter how many tears you cry this calendar. Sittin' on top of the world, like view from a freedom train for the flower child who let's his story bloom over pages of prose like building this garden for us. Taking it back to 1989 for his debut in the same 12 months Haim's album of the year ('Women In Music Pt. III') features the 'Mr. Cab Driver' like discrimination protest song of 'Man From The Magazine', Lenny 'Let's Love Rule' like we all should for his first book named after his first album. Picture perfect portraying a coming of age story in black and white America like 'The Jeffersons' that leads up to the albums original 90's eve release for the chronicles of his volume one.

"Loooooove!" The audiobook opening sings like the first note of Lenny's signature song this very book is named after. The perfect company to fall through this Autumn like leaves as the pages you leaf through turn as smoothly as 'Black Velveteen', or are just told to you like a bedtime story (ladies!) by the 'It Ain't Over' Till It's Over' man himself. Just like 'Me', this time last years memoir by Elton John, prelude and postscript introduced and closed by the 'Tiny Dancer', before the 'Rocketman' who played him himself, Taron Egerton told the rest of his story like a beautiful, bohemian biopic he starred in. As an aside I wouldn't recommend listening to Sir Elton's autobiography if your apartment as thin walls, as every other chapter your neighbor will think you are telling him to shove something up his arse. Just saying. Right now, 'Let Love Rule' will find itself like life's way on your bookshelf next to Alicia Keys' amazing autobiography, 'More Myself: A Journey' next to her latest, first namesake, self-titled, acclaimed album and the space reserved for the audacity and hopeful fathers dreams of President Barack Obama's latest book, 'A Promised Land' coming soon like the place we as a people are getting to now. Coming of age and of stage, this before they were famous, behind the scenes book look is like 'Acid For The Children' by the bass for your face Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers also released at this time last year just in time for under your tree like away in a manger. The chicken before the egg story before the history. You don't get to this destination of his in concert today without this musical journey. From family to rocking like Sly Stone, all the way to the Hendrix covers of a Rolling Stone, just like a black Beatle with Jagger swagger.

Father and son stories like Cat Stevens. A mother's love like our reason for breathing. Gossip folks won't have much to talk about when it comes to the book version of 'Let Love Rule', but adding this album to the singers catalogue offers us a more deeper portrait of the man with those eyes behind the iconic, signature shades that could even make Bono blush. You too will be impressed with the Joshua Tree rock roots of a true hero for songwriting juxtaposition and social justice, especially in these times were Black Lives still Matter in black and white America. Raised my parents from different races, young Lenny faced all types of trouble in a land that still needed to reach the promised one we're still climbing of being judged by the content of your character and not the color of your skin. Still Kravitz let's it and the upbringing of all his uplifting life experiences that counter, to bleed his way into the culture and the arena of mainstream music from New York bars with guys and dolls to selling out stadiums like Guns and Roses, all before performing on the 'Blueprint' of a track by Jay-Z of the same name. Before the Grammy's came a famous family like the one he and former wife and actress Lisa Bonet gave birth too in the flowers for Zoe. The first 25 years of this man's life explored and recounted in just a leaf shade under 300 pages is one many would wish to only live in centuries. Its just that inspirational and iconic in all its influence. Last week in the European like Jiyūgaoka of Tokyo, Japan I masked up to go out for a date with a women I'd been talking to for weeks. As we looked for a place to eat and drink we walked past a coffee store come book shop that echoed down the cobble streets with the words, "so many tears I've cried, so much pain inside, so many years we've tried, to keep this love alive." The lyrics to Lenny Kravitz's sweetly soulful, huge hit, 'It Ain't Over 'Till It's Over' that lost far from family and friends in the Far East needs no translation like Sofia, Scarlett or Mr. Murray. Words and sentiment that right now have so much pure poignancy amongst this perplexed and punctuated year of peril and perspective. Hand-in-hand walking along and carrying on we ain't done yet. It's not over. We've only just begun. Now after letting this book in to our quarantined home this 2020 of COVID-19 lockdown, we can't wait for love to rule again like the embrace of joining hands. Now like waiting for a new year and day, let the needle drop as we turn the page on volume two. TIM DAVID HARVEY.

“I mean, let love rule. That's the statement — and it has been for 30 years,” he says. “And that is the way I try to live my life every day.” - Lenny Kravitz. 

#TAPEDECKSHUFFLE - OutKast #Stankonia20 Special

Stanks For The Memories.

2020 has really smelt like poo-poo-oh, but at least 20 years ago we had something that stank good. Thank you smelly much! On a great Friday in hip-hop this weekend gone, the most "Woo-ha", energetic rapper of all-time, Busta Rhymes returned after a wonder eight years to release the sequel to his 1998 classic 'Extinction Level Event 2: The Wrath Of God' for the end of the world as we know it. The same time Common surprised us with another album full of hope for part one of 'The Beautiful Revolution'. Part two begins after the election this week. And if that wasn't enough OutKast released a deluxe edition of their masterpiece 'Stankonia' two decades later. A record that featured both 'Ms. Jackson' and 'So Fresh, So Clean' on the same damn album and so much more. One so black and white American flag legendary before ASAP Rocky that Houston Rockets dynamic duo James Harden and Russell Westbrook rocked the exact Sir Lucious Left Foot and Three Stacks look for a GQ Magazine cover feature for the former Oklahoma City Thunder teammate reunion return last year. So in its honour let's bring back out old 'Tape Deck Shuffle' (which also feels like 20 years ago...nobody uses tape decks anymore...except hip-hop that inspired this series) feature to celebrate. You remember how it goes? Side A is the original definitive tracks. Side B is the best of the deluxe. All to give stanks.

SIDE A

MS. JACKSON - I'm sorry competition. But this is for real. Never mean to make you cry, but I won't apologise a thousand times.

SO FRESH, SO CLEAN - Popping tags like Big did on Jay-Z's 'Blueprint' too, Boi did these two from the A floss on everybody again all in mink. Stepping to the club in the video and stepping over everybody with that Lucious Left Foot long ballet, pointed toe dip to the puddles of the curb. Even Pennywise couldn't f### with this sidewalk killing with Andre 3000 pulling off the yellow slicker like he was about to lose an arm.

B.O.B. (BOMBS OVER BAGHDAD) - You want to talk about an explosion? This song doesn't let up from the first lyrical detonation from Andre 3000 to the final burst, "bob your head, rag top" call and response. BANG!

GASOLINE DREAMS - But if you want to really talk about igniting a track, or even a whole album from the moment you set it off, this fuse throws everything on the fire. "Burn motherf#####, burn American dream." Now how d'ya like that slice of apple pie? BOOM! 

HUMBLE MUMBLE (Feat. Erykah Badu) - People say Erykah does something to rappers. From Common's 'Electric Circus' (actually an epic, experimental, underrated classic), to Andre 3000 taking it out of this world. We say she's the best thing to happen to H.E.R. since the 'Love Of My Life'.

SIDE B

SO FRESH, SO CLEAN (Feat. Snoop Dogg, Sleepy Brown) - What beats a remix that is so original it doesn't even sound like the original? One with the original P.I.M.P., legend and best guest feature rapper of all-time spelling his name, Snoop Dogg. Permed and pimpin' since pimpin' been pimpin'. Chuuuuch!

B.O.B. (BOMBS OVER BAGHDAD) (Zach De La Rocha Remix) - What more can we say about this remix, like what more can we say about 'Bombs Over Baghdad'? Well how about this? This Zach De La Rocha remix is as good as the Puff Daddy and the Family rock remix of 'It's All About The Benjamins' that rages against the machine.

MS. JACKSON (Mr. Drunk Remix) - Get drunk to this one...that is all. Or is that get crunk?

SO FRESH, SO CLEAN (Acapella) - Want to know how fresh? Want to know how clean? Let them spell it out for you, no beat, all acapella. 

MS. JACKSON (Acapella) - Or what better way to apologize and show you are for real? TIM DAVID HARVEY.

REVIEW: ELVIS COSTELLO - HEY CLOCKFACE

 

4/5

Costello Music.

Spectacle stuck between the rock and roll of fellow Liverpudlian's The Beatles and a first namesake, King crowning Presley place, Elvis Costello still makes legendary music (oh and as an aside, for the record we know he wasn't born in Birkenhead, but instead London's Paddington like the bear...but this Sandgrounder so close from Southport will take it). So much so the icon spins a wheel of fortune of songs at concerts (remember those?) for fans spoilt for choice when it comes to his greatest hits. The man in black like Cash and the reason I buy bifocals has more albums than he has prescription lenses under those stetsons. From the drums that sound like nothing else, stampeding in like elephants with his band The Attractions. Or The Imposters of last years almost album, 'Purse' EP. To even cutting a record with Jimmy Fallon's 'Late Night' house band and hip-hop legendary Roots crew (the wonderful 'Wise Up Ghost' back in 2013), between 'Alison's' and 'She', his own talk show like Letterman back in the day and an 'Austin Powers' cameo. Now one of the greatest of all-time comes back alive out of quarantine with an album as big as the new Busta Rhymes bang (the super sequel 'Extinction Level Event 2: The Wrath Of God') and surprise EP from urban legend Common ('A Beautiful Revolution (Pt.)'). Not to mention the 20th anniversary deluxe release of OutKast's 'Stankonia' ("stank love" forever. Forever ever? Forever ever!) and that Rage remix of 'Bombs Over Baghdad (B.O.B.)' for the machine now this great with hip-hop Roots moves in rap circles. One big weekend after last weeks letter from alumni, luminary, Boss, Bruce Springsteen and the wordless reply from this generations greatest, Ben Harper because 'Winter Is For Lovers'. No longer staring at the clock on the wall like Willie Nelson, Costello turns his new album 'Hello Clockface' (clockface people...clockface) just in time in the fall of the truly, terrible 2020 that was supposed to be Gastby old sport. But the party's not over yet people. With his 31st album and his first full-length since 2018's 'Look Now' take a gander at the Guggenheim worthy album artwork and see Elvis is still painting perfect pictures even in the obliterated outlook of this calendar. Thank you very much.

Poetry prose opens this clock with 'Revolution #49' for fans of the fab four. Elvis evokes compelling narratives as he "cold as stone" says, "the land was white, the wind a dagger/Life beats a poor man to his grave/Love makes a rich man from a beggar/Love is the one thing we can save." All before rip roaring raw into the best song off the album and his in years to get us started. Waving 'No Flag', but tearing through the strings as he sings," I've got no religion/I've got no philosphy/I've got a head full of ideas and words that don't seem to belong to me" in protest. All for an anthem that could march the streets of a million men from Selma to Black Lives Matter. Adding, "Here's a line in the sand/A word or two in the aftermath." Chortling in chorus, ""You could shake my hand/If I could unfold my fist/If I were a gentleman/If I were a Christian/But I wouldn't risk it/Why would you?/You know my name now/And it's "Mister" to you," for the last laugh in the, 'They're Not Laughing At Me Now' for the haters in this generation of division. A tonic for our troubled times, Costello rhymes," "To keep out the nonsense/And block out the needing/To keep up her spirits/With improving reading/But the ink from the columns/Dissolved down into the stain/On the bare wood floor/That extended to the door", on the headlines of the organ haunting and grinding 'Newspaper Pane' for our news of a coronavirus stricken world like a Queen album or new Tom Hanks Western. But just you wait for the back of the paper, closing 'Byline' that lyrically you should really read all about. "You'll see my photo beside the article/"That's just some guy I used to know/I was never his/He was always mine/But I wrote him off by line by line"/By line by line by line by line by line by line." Stop press! Now how's that for a closing statement? But like the beauty of 'I Do (Zula's Song)' in a time where, 'Radio Is Everything', he and we ain't done. 

"We're All Cowards Now' Costello chides in a Trump time that has turned all our piss and vinegar into brine. "The emptiness of arms/The openness of thighs/The pornography of bullets/The promises and prizes can't disguise/We are all cowards now", he tells is like it is during a perplexing period were likes have replaced love and we continue to shoot and f### each other to death. 'Hey Clockface/How Can You Face Me' he asks on the alt album title track that just goes around and 'round like these quarantined days and the hands we have over our eyes, even though we're holding up a smartphone as we idly swipe past genuine and genius all for the Apple we shouldn't Adam bite on the eve of the end of the worst year. Helsinki, Paris and New York held home for the recordings of this 14 track EP, at the same time as his wonderful wife, Canadian jazz singer Diana Krall released her latest classic ('This Dream Of You') this year. It's been 'The Whirlwind' like he storms on that twister of a track before giving us the storytelling, 'Hetty O'Hara Confidential', journaling journalists again with his second single. "She could kill a man with a single stroke/She's not the one you want to provoke" he warns, "if you can't take the heat/or if you can't take the joke" in classic Costello tones. This all newspaper rolls into 'The Last Confession Of Vivian Whip' changing roles as Elvis tell us all about it in epic eulogy. "Hear the last confession of Vivian Whip/If you're reading this/"My life was lonely/Never hurt a fly/Or spared a kiss/Never killed a soul/Except my own."" Storytelling hasn't been this stellar since Dylan went in on what happened to JFK in '63 behind the knoll with 'Rough and Rowdy Ways'. 'What Is It That I Need That I Don't Already Have' he asks in solitary solace on one of the last tracks, finding comfort at home in inspired isolation, quarantining with the one he holds dear. Diana. But still wondering if woe will befall him before the calendar turns. "Some glasses for my eyes and an hour or two of speed/My hands don't blister/My hands don't bleed" he closes all before he finds the words to this wonder on 'I Can't Say Her Name'. "How can I show my face?/I'm a mess and I fear I may confess/I'm a fool with or without her/Make up what you will about her/It's part of the game/I can't say her name." Our narrator looking for love, but trying to find himself as he loses, as Elvis gives us another rock and roll winner 'round the clock that will keep us ticking over like that face on the wall. Oh hey! Far away and East in Japan, isolated from my friends and family back home (although I am living the life, I can't complain), there's an autobiography from Elvis Costello ('Unfaithful Music') waiting for me back at home near Liverpool, like 'Carol' or a warm embrace. But at 688 pages long and cinder block, hardbook big, I have book, but can't travel with it (can't travel light anyway). But that's OK, one day I'll return to it like a bookmark and far more important things I hold close. Until then Elvis and the story of ourselves, is still being written. No matter the byline or time. Face that clock on your wall. TIM DAVID HARVEY. 

Playlist Picks: 'No Flag', 'We Are All Cowards Now', 'Byline'.