Posted in Album of the Month, Music chat, podcast

Podcast Episode 29 | Ab Soul | Herbert

Welcome to Episode 71 of This Is Not Happening, an Album of the Month podcast. In Part 1, we do a deep drive review of our Album of the Month. This month David is even more animated than usual as he has chosen 'Oh Yeah', Steve Lacy's new album to discuss.In Part 2, we play Spin It or Bin It, we pick a theme and all pick songs that represent that theme. This month, taking inspiration from 'Oh Yeah?' our theme is 'duets'.               — Part 1 | Album of the Month | Steve Lacy | Oh Yeah? —Like Olivia last week, Steve Lacy started his musical career early being part of the Odd Future collective and the critical, creative force behind the Odd Future off-shoot 'The Internet'. 'Oh Yeah?' is Steve's 3rd solo studio album and follows 2022's Gemini Rights as his breakthrough album launching him into super-star status (?). The track 'Bad Habits' owned the internet for a good 12 months. But 'Oh Yeah?' sounds different. It is doing different things, while still doing some of the same things. David has been awaiting this release for months. Will he be happy? Joey didn't think much of Gemini Rights … so will this one work better? As for Nolan and Guy, who knows, anything could happen.Have a listen, tell us what you think.Listen to the original album here.Watch some of hisr videos here,particularly the amazing 'Doom' I love this Zone Lowe interview with Steve – starts cold, warms up.I got a lot from these 2 reaction videos Bob The Poppop and Turning Tables.                                     — Part 2 | Spin It or Bin It | Duets —Steve Lacy's new album features 3 tracks where he collaborates with other artists. Are they duets? Are the collaborations? Are they 'Tracks that feature ….'. What's the difference? With this in mind we pick 'Duets' as this month's Spin It or Bin It Theme'. The task is pick a track that fits the theme, the objective, get more 'spins' than your friends. We each pick four tracks for a 16 track play list . We then each pick select 1 track and ask the simple question 'Spin It Or Bin It'?Nolan picks American Boy by Estelle and Kanye West.David picks Wedding Song by Anais Mitchell & Justin Vernon.Joey picks The Boy is Mine by Brandy and Monica.Guy picks Barcelona by Freddie Mercury & Monsterrat Caballe.We've been writing the blog for years come and have a look – https://thisisnothappening.net/
  1. EP.71 | Steve Lacy | Oh Yeah?
  2. EP.70 | Olivia Rogrigo | You seem pretty sad …
  3. EP. 69 | Lykke Li | The Afterparty
  4. EP.68 | Robyn | Sexistential
  5. EP.67 | Eliza | The Darkening Green

Our first AOTM episode in 2023 finds us exploring Ab Soul’s ‘Herbert’ in Part 1 and we focus on New Music for ‘Spin It or Bin It’ in Part 2.

Part 1 | Album of the Month | Ab Soul | Herbert

It’s Nolan’s choice this month and he’s taking us to his spiritual home – Hip Hop with Ab Soul’s late 2022 release, ‘Herbert’. For once, we’re all coming to this artist pretty fresh . Nolan’s been banging on about the singles from this album for like 6 months so giving the album some extended love seems a natural choice.

If you’ve not heard it, we think it’s well worth a listen …

  • Go listen to the album – Here
  • Go watch some videos – Here
  • Go buy some merch – Here 

Our discussion focuses on how we’d describe the album, mental health, suicide and how these topics impact the album, the length of the album, the bangers and of course we touch on a few of the clangers too.

We mention a few things that we’d highly recommend checking out, so here are the links;

  • YouTube interview with Charlamagne Tha God – Here
  • GQ interview – Here
  • Joey’s alternative, 10 track playlist that focuses on the bangers – Here
  • Guy’s alternative, 11 track playlist that focuses on the narrative – Here

Part 2 | Spin It or Bin It | ‘New Music’ (Nov ’22 onwards)

We all pick a tack based on a theme and present to the rest of us to ask the simple question, Spin it or Bin it? The theme this month is a simple one ‘New Music’. The only rule is that the track has to be released after November 2022. We chose albums from as far a field as Doncaster and Russia.

  1. David chose – ‘Nothing Left to Loose’ by Everything But the Girl 
  2. Nolan chose – ‘Like a Heart Won’t Beat’ by Skinny Pelembe  
  3. Joey chose – ‘Let’s Hold Our Hands Together’ by Kito Jempere
  4. David chose – ‘Gorilla’ by Little Simz

Next Month

David is in the hot seat for AOTM and he’s bringing Rozi Plain’s new album ‘Prize’ to the table. We’re all getting stuck in and seeing how we live with the album for a month or so. In Part 2, ‘Spin It or Bin It?’ will be a good one too … the theme next month is Protest Music.

We’ve been writing the blog for years come and have a look – https://thisisnothappening.net/