Video & Audio: Black country, new roads

Taking the stigma out of stigmata

Shy Carter & Frank Ray: “Jesus at the Taco Truck”

A mainstream country song that uses conventional Nashville cleverness to treat an undocumented immigrant as a human being? Even if the subject is more properly a Jesús who saves (all his money to send back home), it’s easy to see how this might’ve perturbed some people’s religions for the better if anyone had heard it. Keep trying.

Beyoncé: “Texas Hold ’Em”

As the person who wrote the best (by far) clause about Bey as a resource allocation problem, it’s unsurprising that I think this is more lyrically interesting than the so-many-carriages one, but it’s more musically accomplished too. While her “choo”/“too” has been rightly acclaimed, the most fun part to me is “take it to the floor” dropping down into talk, as if that’s sufficient to prove her well-funded 2032 sprechsgesang album will leave Wet Leg high and dry.

Lloyiso: “Something in the Orange”

Lloyiso is a major rising South African singer I’ll have more to say about in a couple of weeks. For now: hey, this is actually a good song! Usually I prefer overwriting to be paired with undersinging, but it turns out that emoting is better than recounting your disintegrating relationship like you’ve found a seed in your citrus fruit.

Cassper Nyovest: “Ever Changing Times”

Mild South African rapper speeds up Aretha and Michael McDonald’s minor 1991 AC hit to brag about his durability, praise God, and rhyme “will.i.am” with “feel I am”. Apparently times have changed back to when The College Dropout dropped. 

Megan Thee Stallion: “Hiss”

Speaking of Rappers of the Decade, looks like a second consecutive one might be beginning an insanity spiral. I’d be taking special care to look after my mental health and avoid pointless Internet beef if I were [does math] uh, Megan Thee Stallion.

Chinese Football: “Wuhan”

Regular readers will know that emo isn’t my thing (unless it’s barely disguised verbose power pop), and that mostly goes for Chinese emo too. But this is an especially moving tribute to their unfortunately maligned city, and I’m not going to hold their getting a little flowery against them this time.

Caity Baser: “I’m a Problem”

In the great tradition of wannabes kicking around the bottom of the British charts, genuinely irritating, down to the uptalk and random shouting. She’s obviously using feminism for her own ends—previous titles include “Haters” and “Slut Shaming”—but that’s part (not all) of what it’s for.

Mackenzie Carpenter: “Huntin’ Season”

You don’t have to be a major singer (yet) to have fun if your idea of manless fun is drinking two or even three glasses with the girls and not having to fiddle with the toilet seat, and if you don’t have to have to sell wordplay any more subtle than “oh dear.” The video, on the other hand, offers a lot of text and subtext, and if this was Any Old Substack you might be getting a thinkpiece on it right now so count yourselves lucky.

Sote: “River of Pain”

Other Dave promoted this act of Iranian electrominimalism but said it was way too long. I dunno, the big industrial noise in the middle is like a bridge and then I want to hear the buzzy microtonal chord that’s something of a hook a few more times. Maybe the last minute of breakdown is unnecessary, but 4’33” is a fitting runtime.

Twice: “Rush”

Et tu, Twice: even Korea’s top-ranked girl group has joined the post-Pantheress trend. And it suits them well, giving them a little backbone after a few years of sickliness. (Aside: color-coded lyric videos are definitely one of the most useful technological breakthroughs of recent years; thank you stans.)

Muni Long: “Made for Me” (Yumbs’ Amapiano remix)

A simple sex-but-mostly-love song that’s become her second top 20 hit gets a bouncier mattress thanks to the Donk. There’s also a Ghost Town DJs remix: sure, she’s hedging her bets, but I approve of her doing so in ways that pander the interests of the column.

Benson Boone: “Beautiful Things”

Oh come on, it’s fine. The theology isn’t exactly at Jelly Roll’s level, but his singing is just annoying enough to be interesting, and the moment I stop responding to quiet-LOUD at a gut level, it’ll be time to throw in the towel on this here Substack and go back to statistics blogging.

Cheb Mohamed Seghir: “Khalouni”

Reactions to raï going teenpop in the ’80s varied.