TRACK OF THE WEEK
Nines ft J Hus
High Roller
I doubt Harlesden MC Nines is as well-off as he claims on High Roller, but he is definitely good at boasting about money. He smirks about shopping in Harrods and having a second “sidechick house” where he takes his flings, with J Hus Auto-Tune-sniggering behind him. British rappers have never been good at financial braggadocio (Wiley once made a song about sensible budgeting) but if he keeps making music like this, Nines could one day be as rich as he says he is.
Mariah Carey ft YG
I Don’t
Compton rapper YG was only three months old when Mariah released her debut, and that age difference is the unspoken star of the song. Mariah does her best to revive her hip-hop credibility by using hip slang such as “gassed up the whip”, while YG taunts his older woman: “You don’t understand me/ But you love it when I call you Ms Carey.” Somehow you can believe they could be scorned lovers, even if the vibe is less The Graduate and more Stifler’s mom.
Nickelback
Feed The Machine
I used to have a begrudging respect for Nickelback for continuing to mine the rich seam of unlistenable soft rock, despite becoming famous for being the worst band in the world. But recent jokes made at their expense seem to have got under their skin. Now they’ve returned as a faux metal band replete with doomy shouting and overblown guitar solos. That’s not how this works, guys; we’re not all suddenly going to think you’re hardasses now. This is like a dweeby kid getting bullied for his knitted jumpers, so coming into school the next day wearing a bandana and a gold chain – then getting bullied way, way worse.
London Grammar
Big Picture
The band that Radio 1 always play after a high-profile death or national tragedy are back. This song feels like the result of a dispute over “just how Coldplay we should go on the second record”, with the group reaching a happy medium: anthemic but not singalong and teasing reverb guitars that seem as if they’re heading for a stadium but end up parking outside a 1,000-capacity venue in a mid-sized northern town.
Future Islands
Ran
Dad! Your favourite band are on! Yes, you remember you loved their Jools performance and made me get you their album for Christmas. Yeah! The ones with the dancing guy who makes the weird faces. Well, they’ve got a new single. What does it sound like? Well exactly the same as all the songs on that album I got you. What do you mean that was, itself, unbearably samey and you’re over them now? God, parents today are so fickle.
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