Hi Robert. We’re discussing a very important record, you said: Stormzy’s.
‘Yes, of course. All of England was looking forward to his new album This Is What I Mean (12 numbers). Unfortunately we were not able to listen to it in advance, so the review will come a little later. Still, this is definitely the record of the week.
‘Stormzy became famous with grime: South London rap that was once associated with crime by the police. But in 2019 he headlined the Glastonbury Festival, suddenly making him the darling of all of Britain. That created enormous pressure, he said when I interviewed him. He doubted himself a lot: after Glastonbury he almost walked off the stage crying, falsely convinced that he had screwed up.
Even after that phenomenal performance, Stormzy continued to have doubts. Some fans thought he sang too much, they thought he should rap more, and vice versa. He retired three years, until today This Is What I Mean came out. It’s Stormzy’s soul record, he says himself. Not because it’s soul music, but because this is what’s in his soul. He sings a lot on this record, accompanied by pianos and strings. Stormzy is very frank in his lyrics. It’s a beautiful personal record, which is more about R&B and jazz than hip-hop. The number Need You is the most remarkable song: samba combined with R&B, and the beautiful dark voice of Stormzy. Also Bad Blood, and break-up number, I think is very cool. On this album you hear exactly what Stormzy wants to make himself, without thinking about success.’
That sounds good. What else did you listen to that is worth recommending?
‘World Records (★★★☆☆, 11 tracks) by Neil Young & Crazy Horse. Young is now 77 years old, but it is not unusual that he has released another record, because he does that almost every year. He’s been making protest music all his life. Almost everyone is now busy with the climate, but Young has been doing that for fifty years; he sang about, among other things, the overexploitation of the earth in 1990 and made songs against genetic modification of Starbucks.
World Records is a moving record full of songs like this. He seems to want to hand over the baton, as he sings on the song I Walk With You. A nice message: he walks across the planet and realizes that he will no longer be here, but sings that he will still walk with us.
“The Young fan can certainly enjoy this album, with the song Chevy for example; an old man rock number of fifteen minutes long. It’s a kind of farewell song about the roads behind him, where he used to drive his old Chevrolet. A beautiful song, I got a lump in my throat. Young isn’t bitter, he’s not anxious, he’s content with his memories. And of course he’s one of the greatest artists ever – I hope he keeps going.’
This is also worth listening to this week:
on Dawn of the Freak ( ★★★☆☆, 10 songs) you can hear beautiful icy guitar lines under the pinched voice of Joachim Liebens, aka The Haunted Youth. It is reminiscent of the early eighties, writes Gijsbert Kamer.