Takes by the Ocean: Shoveling Shit Into Shoegaze, Singing Björk’s Blues

Grappling with influencees of Joni, Beauty Pill, Indigo Girls

Feeble Little Horse (Photo by Gem Fair)

YES

Noname, Sundial

Any lifelong rap lover knows the score: Mind-blowing rhymes and addictively masterful beats forever wrapped around knuckleheaded provocations like an inoperable hernia. Except it would’ve been all too easy for “Balloons” to jettison a Jay Electronica all too happy to cosplay Professor Griff instead of, you know, getting a job. Still, like the execrable Kodak Black on Doechii’s Top 40-rounding “What It Is (Block Boy),” I’m not even necessarily sure I want it gone. Maybe I’m too befallen with Stockholm syndrome from too many favorite problematic classics — before he disavowed Kanye’s anti-Semitism, Pusha T boasted his crack “cools to a tight wad, the Pyrex is Jewish.” Or maybe including the ugly and stinky as part of the rhetorical overrun just feels inherent to the most fascinating genre of music for 50 years running, as abstractly thrilling as dozens of stray darts flung on Fatima Warner’s deadliest and best album, from “cat piss on popcorn” to taking Rihanna, Kendrick Lamar, and pop’s richest power couple down with her. On the other hand, she welcomes a fired-up Common to $ilkmoney and Billy Woods’ resistance. A new problematic classic to ponder its contradictions from countless angles, including stoned. I’ve always preferred Fear of a Black Planet to Nation of Millions myself.