TRACK OF THE WEEK
Missy Elliott ft Lamb
I’m Better
This is Missy Elliott’s third single in as many years. I had no idea. The last time I properly listened to her I had Snake on my phone, so free from the lucrative tug of the Superbowl and Gap ads, her return is a sight for my sore eyes. Not much has changed: Elliott’s wry delivery still holds up and this song spools along nicely at half-pace, with Lamb (also producer) having his first go at rapping (decent). Combined with the salty refs to Orlando, Scandal and Kanye’s breakdown, this proves that she’s still incredibly relevant.
Father John Misty
Pure Comedy
In his defence, Misty rarely promises a rose garden, but man alive ... old keys, restive percussion and a thrilling horn section serve as platforms for gender inequality, consumerism, political qualification and gallows humour. He’s even written an accompanying essay. One for heads and the sadsacks, then.
LIFE
Euromillions
While I’m pretty sure the lyrics were lifted from the Socialist Worker, there’s nothing wrong with a reactive song written in the aftermath of Brexit. These guys use “like” as a suffix, heckle incomprehensible soundbites about democracy and are really, really into Sleaford Mods. But any song about austerity and class will obviously hit our sweet spot so, you know, right on.
Diet Cig
Tummy Ache
Any other week, I would have marked this as twee sub-Cranberries pap. But this week, the teen angst lyrics sound like Raymond Carver, and Alex Luciano’s voice has flown me direct to the land of milk and honey. And I hate flying.
Jamiroquai
Automaton
When this started playing, I thought I’d opened too many tabs on my computer. Genuinely. I tried closing some, but these sounds just kept coming at me. It was quite frightening. Three listens in, I had located about 14 different songs, some vocoder and, I think, a possessed smoke alarm. The message is stock Jamiroquai – the internet is bad, dystopia is nigh, Jay Kay loves to love – but the tune itself lopes along so aimlessly that I literally found myself buying shares in Yahoo to make a point. To be fair, Jay Kay’s looking hench in the video... Oh and he raps now – very nearly cool.
