![]() ![]() This influence comes to the fore here, particularly through the metallic, mid-fi percussion and the 36 Chambers organ that shows up here and there. Perhaps more importantly, he’s an astute fan of New York City hip hop. ![]() His mom worked in Spike Lee’s studio, there’s an Art Deco vibe to his King Krule album art, and the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat informed both his debut single and the vibrant collages collected in the A New Place book. Though A New Place 2 Drown is all about London, Marshall has always been more informed by gritty NYC high art. It’s his best release so far by miles, and it feels like a culmination of everything he’s done up to this point. A New Place 2 Drown hones in on Marshall’s world-building abilities to the expense of almost everything else, playing unequivocally to his strengths in the process. Marshall has always stood out because of the places he evokes with his music – iron-grey, cold, distinctly urban, also kind of beautiful. Rodaidh McDonald made the critical mistake of assuming he was while producing his debut 6 Feet Beneath The Moon, resulting in an underwhelming indie-rock slog that robbed Marshall’s music of its textural intricacy. This is not a singer-songwriter album by any means, which is appropriate given that Marshall’s never really been a singer-songwriter. The rainy textures and mechanical, hollow percussion create a vivid sense of place, and Marshall’s vocals – firmly in the foreground on his prior work as King Krule and Zoo Kid – are relegated to the background, more like samples than anything else. Look at the cover: it’s a prime park smoking bench, graffiti and all, and the trees and faint lights in the background should provide endless entertainment to someone with enough THC in their bloodstream. There’s danger, both from the environment and the people that populate it, but small-scale awe takes precedence. ![]() It’s a stoner’s approach to the world, perhaps closer in spirit to psychedelia or ambient music than the hip hop that informs it. A New Place 2 Drown is a snow globe of this place, 38 minutes of eerie, atmospheric hip hop that sketches an evocative portrait of a world you might not want to visit but don’t necessarily need to – listening to the album is as good as doing so. The album and its accompanying book are all about the world the 21-year-old inhabits, a London filled with dirty gutters and unsavory characters with crowbars but also beautiful urban landscapes and endless possibilities for exploration. Perhaps – but Marshall’s clearly in awe of it. “Girl, this place is evil,” growls Archy Marshall on “Thames Water,” the seven-minute coda to his second studio album A New Place 2 Drown. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |