WIBLT: Top of Da Mornin
What I've Been Listening To, 9/15/21
‘What I’ve Been Listening To’ is a bi-weekly series that highlights 8 projects, 1 song, and 1 video that have been on repeat for me. Be sure to follow the ‘What I’ve Been Listening To’ playlist that is always up to date with the eight standout tracks from all of these posts in 2021.
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Prim & Propa - Connie Constance
4 tracks, 13 minutes
Released: September 3rd, 2021
From: Watford, Hertfordshire
Genres: Indie Rock, Pop
Recommended For Fans Of: Nilüfer Yanya, Jackie Hayes, Cosima
Connie Constance released her debut album in 2019, and now with the release of Prim & Propa, she’s released an EP in each year since then. Constance’s sound adds a soulful touch to the electrifying sound of indie pop/rock, which she credits to her upbringing. Growing up in the outskirts of north London, she says she spent her teens listening to rock like The Arctic Monkeys and The Stone Roses with her white friends at school, while her black and mixed-race friends at home would share hip-hop and R&B with her. Other family members would introduce her to punk and reggae as well. Early on that lead to a disconnect in what she wanted her own sound to be. “I definitely had confusion in the early days of working out what I wanted my sound to be like. I’d grown up on punk and indie-rock and that’s what I love, but everyone keeps wanting me to do R&B. I don’t really understand R&B as much as I do Britpop and indie-rock,” she told NME last year. “Musically, I feel like I’ve found myself now. I feel comfortable with where I’m at.” Shedding the labels and expectations to make music that’s inherently her is how we ended up with this excellent four-track EP. The lead single “Electric Girl” has not left my rotation since dropping in March, and it’s joined here by the recent titular single as well as two brand new songs.
Standout Track: Electric Girl
MANG FI - papa mbye
6 tracks, 19 minutes
Released: September 1st, 2021
From: Senegal->Minneapolis, MN
Genres: Hip-Hop/Rap
Recommended For Fans Of: Tony Velour, JPEGMAFIA
Once a teenage park caricature artist, Papa Mbye (pronounced like ehm-bay) has grown and turned his talents towards music with the debut EP MANG FI. Prior to quarantine, Mbye had a noncommittal relationship with music, nothing more than some freestyles and house shows here and there. It wasn’t until lockdown that he started actually working with production software and laying down his tracks. To his credit, Mbye has a production credit on every track of this project. The beats on hear are very fluid, breathing and evolving within the tracks themselves. While listening I frequently found myself checking to see if I was still on the same track or if there was a beat change. Themes of loneliness and self-discovery swirl around these songs, circling back to feelings he felt early on in life when his family first immigrated from Senegal to Minneapolis. “When I came here, I always stuck out so much. I always got noticed very easily,” Mbye told The Minnesota Daily. “I still didn’t feel normal or like I wasn’t included, and I guess it’s hard to shake it. Those feelings never left me.” Luckily for Mbye, his music is poised to stand out and get noticed in that exact same way. MANG FI doesn’t fit in anywhere, and it doesn’t need to.
Standout Track: Nofoodinmytummy
Girl K Is For The People - Girl K
6 tracks, 20 minutes
Released: September 10th, 2021
From: Chicago, IL
Genres: Alternative, Indie Rock
Recommended For Fans Of: Beach Bunny, Jay Som
America’s Got Talent reject Kathy Patino started Girl K as a solo project in 2017, but as shows and recordings went on it eventually grew into the four piece outfit it is today. Indie rock with emotional depth, that’s also easy to dance to, forms the basis for this EP. Girl K delivers a little bit of everything with synth backed tracks, guitar driven tunes, and even an ‘80s ballad -esque song to close out. It’s a project that was written and recorded before the pandemic, but once everything changed they elected to hold on to it until the right moment. By the time the first chorus hits on the opening track “You,” it becomes clear that it was worth the wait. You’ll come away from listening to this knowing Girl K undoubtedly has talent, and that by sharing that talent with us, Girl K is absolutely for the people. This is the band’s second EP with ‘Take This to Heart Records,’ also home to the band PONY I covered earlier in the year.
Standout Track: Girl K Is For The People
White Buffalo Roam - Toner
12 tracks, 30 minutes
Released: September 3rd, 2021
From: Oakland, CA
Genres: Shoegaze, Grunge, Punk, Indie, Alternative
Recommended For Fans Of: Pardoner, Worlds Worst, Big Star
Toner, a five piece band from West End California, returns here with their third LP, White Buffalo Roam. The new project picks up right where they left off on their 2020 album Silk Road. Alex Heigl aptly describes the band’s sound as, “power pop meets shoegaze, mixed through a pair of Robert Pollard’s Chuck Taylors,” for Bandcamp. Ultimately though it’s impossible to narrow Toner’s sound down to one sentence. Even if you think you’ve figured it out, Samuelito Cruz (Toner’s bandleader) with throw something unexpected your way. Take the track '“Under The Gun” which starts out with a hip-hop beat before erupting into the guitars you’re more familiar with from prior tracks. Definitely check this out if you enjoyed the Pardoner record I covered in May, as Toner played the band’s album release show for that project, and they were both mastered by Jack Shirley.
Standout Track: Tar
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Sugarcane - Cocoa Sarai & BlvkM0nd4y
6 tracks, 18 minutes
Released: September 3rd, 2021
From: NY -> LA
Genres: Reggae, Soul
Recommended For Fans Of: Koffee, Alicai Harley
Singer Cocoa Sarai is hot off a string of three great R&B EPs released earlier in the year. But with Sugarcane, she teams up with producer/DJ/artist BlvkM0nd4y to branch out in a slightly different direction. Sarai is a lifelong musician, and has already had a lucrative career behind the scenes working with Dr. Dre, and contributing to the albums Oxnard & Ventura for Anderson .Paak, the latter of which she won a Grammy for contributing to. Between the 2021 EPs mentioned above and Sugarcane, she’s taking her solo music seriously this year. Here the Brooklyn raised singer sidesteps her traditional sound to embrace her family’s Jamaican roots, melding her soulful voice with reggae melodies and instrumentals. With BlckM0nd4y at the helm, they craft a project that makes this change in sound feel completely natural, and a damn good time at that.
Standout Track: Brenda
Heartbeats/Heartbreaks - caro♡
14 tracks, 43 minutes
Released: September 3rd, 2021
From: London, UK
Genres: Pop, Electronic, PC Music
Recommended For Fans Of: Charli XCX, Hannah Diamond, Nasty Cherry
Does caro♡ have what it takes to be the next PC Music star? Well she kind of already is, despite this being her first solo album. caro♡ came up as a member of the three piece synth pop band ‘Planet 1999,’ which was the first band PC Music ever signed in 2018, making her a beacon of both the label’s past and future. While PC Music has been a fundamental part of ushering in hyperpop, this project lives more in the realm of spacey electronic pop. If it was possible to have such a thing as lo-fi hyperpop, it might sound something like this. But enough of my ridiculous attempts to label the sound on here. Heartbeats/Hearbreaks plays as half album half beat tape (hence the heartbreaks half of the title). It’s almost cliche at this point to compare a PC Music artist to Charli XCX since she started closely working with label founder & producer A. G. Cook around 2017. But you can’t quite listen to a song like “Over U” and not hear similarities in their vocals. Also similar to XCX (which was her MSN Messenger name before her artist name), the “♡” in “caro♡” originated as the name she used on Animal Crossing. Still, caro♡ doesn’t subvert to any expectations on this glossily vulnerable debut album.
Standout Track: Over U
Sweet Side - Raquel Rodriguez
14 tracks, 40 minutes
Released: April 23rd, 2021
From: Los Angeles, CA
Genres: R&B, Soul, Funk
Recommended For Fans Of: Otis Kane, Celeste, Anderson .Paak
Raquel Rodriguez is Los Angeles born and bred, and she shows it in the silky smooth sound of her debut album Sweet Side. The Mexican-American singer has created a wide spread tribute to west coast R&B with influence from soul, G-Funk, west coast rap (highlighted by an excellent Ill Camille feature), and electro-funk. That goes for the albums sonics at least, but for her vocals and lyrics, Rodriguez says she is more influenced by singers like Prince, Chaka Khan, and D’Angelo. Very much a performer at heart, Rodriguez got through the past year by making sure she secured a live stream setup to keep that personal fan connection alive. “I need to perform. I need to sing for people. I need to communicate with my fans. I can't just sit here and make music. I'm going to do that anyway but, in the process, I also need to be performing,” she told Qrates. Despite that sentiment, Sweet Side is an album that will win you over whether you’re listening to her sing in person, on streaming, or in a live stream.
Standout Track: Nobody Else
333 - Meatbodies
7 tracks, 30 minutes
Released: September 3rd, 2021
From: Los Angeles, CA
Genres: Rock, Psychedelic
Recommended For Fans Of: Post Animal, Ty Segall, Acid Dad
Meatbodies is the creation of Chad Ubovich, known from the band Fuzz, and they return here with 333, their first album since 2017. Heavy guitar tones throughout this project often feel like they’re living on the sides of the mix, building a wall for the rest of the song to live within. But inside those comforting walls, and behind occasional Beatles like vocal deliveries, there’s a sense of unease. “These lyrics are dark, but I think these are things that a lot of people are feeling and going through,” Ubovich said in a statement. “Here in America, we’re watching the fall of U.S. capitalism, and 333 is a cartoonish representation of that decline.” This is a project that does feel like it’s cartoonishly winking at the listeners sometimes. Even right off the bat with the title, half of the satanic 666, they let you know that they’re not fully diving into these dark themes mentioned above, but will dance around them. That sardonic attitude folds back in on itself by the time you reach the final song, which Ubovich admits was written to satirize the project’s opening track. Here, Meatbodies has created an encapsulating piece of psych rock that is a joy to lose yourself in.
Standout Track: Reach for the Sunn
A Song
Range Brothers - Baby Keem & Kendrick Lamar
What other song could I have possibly included besides this? The song that made everyone stop for a minute during their Friday morning and say “is this clip of Kendrick Lamar saying ‘top of the morning’ repeatedly actually part of a song or is this some kind of meme?” It’s real friends. And it’s glorious.
A Video
Have Mercy - Chlöe
What other video could I possibly have included besides this? She sounds more like a Beyoncé protégée than ever with this track, and I mean that in a good way. If you’re going to be held to another artist’s standard, it might as well be one of the most iconic artists of this generation.
I hope you liked reading all that