Childish Gambino: because the internet – review

A rapper with a parallel career as a comedian, Donald McKinley Glover makes music that can be dark and abrasive but is peppered with moments of oddball humour. On his second studio album, much of that humour exists at the structural level, in the timing of vocal samples, in the incongruity of an overblown guitar solo. In the lyrics, comedy is offset by anxiety – Glover reflects on some unsettling phenomena of our internet-addled age, such as the 3D printing of guns – and his restless delivery (which, intentionally or not, mimics Frank Ocean on several tracks) is matched by jerky, off-kilter production. The results are intriguing, occasionally frustrating, rarely boring.