WEEK 6: DE LA SOUL IS NOT DEAD, LITTLE SIMZ, AND SOUL GLO

The 6OGs are back for the first proper post of 2023, ready for a great year of tunes, shows, memories, and debates.  We encourage you to share with your friends, enemies, and everyone in between and to let us know when you have an album for us to consider and write about.   

And we expect to have plenty to write about, if January is any indication. We start 2023 with a bang, mainly in the world of, or influenced by, hip-hop. First up is a new record by the woman who, at least in Brad’s view, served up 2021’s best album, followed by a bask in the glory of a show by one of 2022’s best bands, and then join the chorus of exultation at the release on digital platforms of music by one of rap’s greatest-ever groups. Stakes is high for the OGs, my friends.

New album: No Thank You by Little Simz. I am not entirely sure why, but Little Simz telling us, “I cut with a different scissor,” at the end of the insanely catchy and groovy track “Gorilla” from her new album has played over and over in my head -- more than perhaps any line in the last six months (or more). Maybe it’s the fact that she’s not bragging about having bigger, sharper, or deadlier scissors – just different. Or maybe it’s the idea of building a bar around such a common household item that instantly makes you connect to it, or that she’s only talking about a single scissor (is that a British thing?). Or maybe still it’s the way her tone goes up and voice trails off exactly as she ends the word “scissor.” Or maybe it’s just that the line builds on top of perhaps the grooviest strings section of a rap song I have heard in some time (just check out how the beat drops and the groove kicks at about the 2-minute mark).

Whatever it is, I have played the song no less than 75 times since I first realized Simz (don’t call her Simmy; she makes clear in “Gorilla” that even her closest friends don’t do that) had dropped a new one out of nowhere. Although you can’t really say it’s out of nowhere. After all, as noted in my 2022 end of year (3A6OG #2022Brad), the mysterious collective Sault put out seven albums in 2022, from the apparently limitless hand of producer Inflo. So, we could say that No Thank You, her follow up to 2021’s remarkable (and my favorite of that year) Sometimes I Might Be Introvert, was Sault coming out with their 8^th release.

The connection goes beyond the shared producer, as Simz has herself appeared on Sault albums before. That framing of "here is another Sault record" may not be fair to Simz and her unique voice that so seamlessly weaves boasting about being greater than Jay-Z (which she’s done on at least 3 albums now) with acknowledging how she has let her friends down and back to proclaiming her connections to love and the universe.  But in the end, it’s not unfair either; that’s at the core of what makes her a clear piece of the Sault puzzle: she transcends genre and style and era while also being grounded in the immediacy of the moment.  

Introvert opened with a huge orchestral intro, demanding that you think of her as anthemic, yet then giving us lines about her insecurities and shortcomings. The album itself then navigated a complicated personal and political world. No Thank You picks up where Introvert left off, though the bigger musical intro comes on “Gorilla” at Track 2 (the Jay-Z boast comes on track 1, though).  The record stays more rooted in the personal, with the notable exception of “X,” where she takes on everything from the history of slavery, the police, and the racism and sexism experienced every day by a black woman.  When she raps these lines:

“Been beaten on, we been chewed on/But it happened years ago, so we should just move on/You think that man don't know pain 'cause he got a suit on?/'Cause he finally got a plate that he can now have food on?/Telling me that luck isn't everybody's friend/But, really you can't fathom that my tree now has fruit on”

I was taken by back to every micro-aggression I’ve been responsible for committing or witnessing and ignoring (and just noting what a remarkable reclamation that last line is of "Strange Fruit").  

Simz’ flow on the new record gets a bit repetitive, if I’m honest, and the songs as a whole have taken me longer to connect to than her last few records. But the music is classic (can we say that after 3-4 years?) Sault – moving from gospel to soul to funk to folk to rock to classical, yet somehow always hip-hop and never jarring. And over time, other tracks, like “No Merci,” have emerged, with "Broken" embodying the Sault connections most clearly. No Thank You, like any of the best Sault records, is meant to reward repeated listens and demands your full attention. On GREY Area, her album before Introvert (which Apple Music says is her "essential") Simz proclaimed, “I’m a boss in a fuckin’ dress/N*****, stay in line.” The latest from Simz makes clear we all better do just that. (Brad)  

Album from an upcoming/recent live show:  Diaspora Problems by Soul Glo. If you spend 30 seconds listening to Diaspora Problems by Soul Glo (year-end reviews at 3A6OG #s2022Brian and 2022Brad), you feel like you’re in the middle of a moshpit or ready to stage dive. But as you throw your elbow, push a sweaty dude back in the pit, or wait for the crowd to catch your dive, you also feel desperate to catch the torrent of words and emotion and pure energy flowing from singer Pierce Jordan (but can we really call him a "singer?" What to call him? Maybe “Screamin’-word poet”?).  Because as 6OGs friend Scott commented during a brief respite in the January 13 show at DC’s Songbyrd, “I feel like something important is happening.”    

Important. That’s precisely what the Soul Glo show hit you as. Black men on vocals and guitar, white men on bass and drums, a remarkably diverse crowd for any show, let alone hardcore punk. Songs hitting you in the face as hard as they can, not because they want you to fight but because they are desperate for you to see, to listen, to stand up, and to act.

I mean, when a vocalist screams at an almost incomprehensible volume and speed, “I try to listen the way/I wanna be listened to,” what do you do? Listening, at least in the traditional sense, feels futile. So maybe his idea of what it means to listen, or to be listened to, is different? Maybe mine needs to change? Maybe I don’t even know what it means “to listen” anymore? And just as I try to ponder that some more, Pierce is screaming, soon joined by the whole crowd, "Who gonna beat my ass?" At that point, you just give up and ride the wave. (But please do yourself a favor, if you want to know what I mean by "screamin'-word poet, and click on the lyrics for this track.)

It’s hard to know where Soul Glo goes from here. The hardcore world is wrestling with the path of its last emerging act, Turnstile, which now includes a Taco Bell ad and opening for Blink 182. Is that what is to become of Soul Glo? It sure feels hard to see that path, but they also need to be playing in front of more than 250 people. This is a band with an album and a live performance that changes things, that is a “what was it like before” band, that is important.

What I do know is that this was a rare show that made me want to get in the car as soon as it was over and put the record back on, with my earplugs on in the car. Because nothing else could suffice. (Brad) 

Album being rediscovered (at least 10 years old): 3 Feet High and Rising by De La Soul.  The arrival of 3 Feet High and Rising to streaming services for the first time ever has set the 6OG offices abuzz.  Rumors of the imminent availability of the album had been around for years, but the appearance of “The Magic Number” last week on Spotify was the actual sign that it was finally happening. 

I think everyone knows this album is a bona fide classic, so I won’t belabor the point.  The genius of the album reveals itself immediately in the first song (skipping the opening skit): “The Magic Number” starts with the Schoolhouse Rock song, “Three is a Magic Number,” layered over a sample of someone else’s sample of Led Zeppelin’s “The Crunge.”  Add in about 20 more samples, including from Johnny Cash, Eddie Murphy, James Brown, Run-DMC, put it in a blender, and you’ve got a song. 

There’s a great number of catchy songs on the album, “Me Myself and I,” “Jenifa Taught Me,” “Eye Know” (which vexingly forces you to love a Steely Dan song), and “Tread Water.”  Beyond the iconic songs, the album also reminds me of several late 80s cultural phenomena that largely can’t exist today. 

This collage-style of song craft, taking multiple samples and manipulating and sewing them together to create something new has served both as the genius of the album as well as the impediment to its streaming distribution.  While the record company actually cleared the 70+ samples when the album was initially released, the release language failed to account for new platforms, like digital streaming.  (Check out this break down of every sample.)  There was little interest in re-clearing the samples, particularly given a particularly bad court ruling against a Biz Markie sample, which upped the exposure for any record company taking on the task.  Such collage-style albums, like Paul’s Boutique and It Takes a Nation of Millions, are just no longer economically feasible but for the deepest pocketed artists.

The song also brings me back to the joy of quality radio.  I initially became aware of the band through its third single, “Me, Myself, and I,” which received a fair amount of MTV airplay.  But the group really clicked for me when I heard “Tread Water” on the radio.  The late 1980s were the heyday for WXRT, a rock radio station in Chicago that was never quite into a single format and was never afraid to explore the deep cuts from an album.  It essentially met half between a commercial rock station and a college station.  In Chicago, it’s pretty fashionable to complain about WXRT, and there can be a lot to complain about (way too much Bodeans), but they have always been proudly independent and not afraid to break new bands and dig beyond the singles.  They would play Led Zeppelin, but it would be the unreleased B-side “Hey Hey What Can I Do.”  Bands I recall hearing for the first time on WXRT include Helmet, the Wonder Stuff, Bob Mould (yeah, I heard the solo stuff first), and Peter Murphy (yeah, I heard the solo stuff first). 

I remember the first I heard “Tread Water” on WXRT as I was closing up at my high school job.  The song was never released as a single, but it is a standout track.  That it was a hip hop song made it even more of a surprise to hear on the air.  Other than KEXP, it’s difficult to find a radio station these days where the next song could be a surprising new band, genre, or track, or an old classic rock chestnut.   

Finally, 3 Feet High and Rising created its own world, rich with its own slang, references, and inside jokes.  They rapped about the “D.A.I.S.Y. age” and “Jennys,” and I initially had no idea what any of it meant.  There was a mystery, and true understanding of the album could only be gained through careful listening, diligent research, and conversations with other fans.  And as you began to shoulder the effort to decipher what these arcane lyrics were about, there was power and community in this knowledge. 

Now, I just googled the “D.A.I.S.Y age” and it stands for ‘da inner sound y’all.”  The internet is great or whatever, but it has ruined the power and mystique of musical knowledge. 

So while these aspects of musical fandom may be lost to history, we’re now gaining De La Soul on streaming services. I’m going to call it a "net" win. (Charles)