The Daily Spin, February 26
Boxplot | Here & Now
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: Here & Now (2022)
Artist: Boxplot
Link:
Drum and bass has never been my cup of tea - not in a bad way, necessarily, but in the sense that I’ve never been exposed to a great deal of it and what I have tasted hasn’t been much to my liking, but Boxplot may have changed that a bit.
I’ll open by saying this - making the opening track eleven minutes long is a bold choice. I respect it. Still a bit crazy to do, given that this is drum and bass and not, say, post-rock, and while there are elements of those genres scattered through this album (and it’s where the album excels, for sure), there are a lot of places where it feels like a slight misstep to blend these two things together. I’m Brittany Broski tasting kombucha the whole way through this album.
There are a few songs that veer almost into pop-like territory, tracks that feel like they’re trying to replicate that feel-good energy, but the album is absolutely at its best when it pushes towards the rock and post-rock elements, letting simple plans carry it home.
Rating: 7.2/10
Best Tracks: Why Try; I Think I Think Too Much
Worst Tracks: Always Here, My Dear