The Daily Spin, February 20
Young Fathers | Heavy Heavy
Welcome back to the Daily Spin, the series in which I review 365 albums during 2023.
Each album will be given a rating on a scale from 0 to 10. You can look at the entire set here. Additionally, you can check out a list of my favorite song from each album right here.
If you want to suggest an album, good news! You can do so right here!
Album: Heavy Heavy (2023)
Artist: Young Fathers
Link:
Young Fathers takes 2018’s Cocoa Sugar and builds on it beautifully, pulling forward lessons about the inherent jubilation and spontaneity of music and applying them to songs that hit a perfect stride of quickness, brisk without feeling frantic.
The album feels communal, like it’s a barbecue and the whole neighborhood is jamming out, an atmosphere only built upon by the ad-libs and choral features. It’s not all like that - songs like ‘I Saw’ lean far more into the group’s hip-hop roots, for one - but even that has its own moments of glory.
I’ve been trying to find the word for this album, and I think the one I’ve settled on is processional. There’s a sot of passive energy dispelled by this album the whole way through, not quite hymn-like or religious, but instead sort of like you’re sitting at a picnic table watching old cars parade through a town square on a sunny afternoon. It’s the sort of energy where something smells real nice, something down the way sounds real good, and you have the chance to get drawn in.
Rating: 8.9/10
Best Tracks: Rice; Geronimo; Tell Somebody
Worst Tracks: Ululation; Drum