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Thursday, July 9, 2015
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com ARTS
MUSIC COLUMN
T
wo of the best albums of
2015 so far have come out
in the past few weeks, and
I’m probably
one of the few
people who
loved both of
them.
This has been a
fantastic month
for music of all
genres. Besides
Miguel’s
ground-
breaking
Wildheart
we’ve heard fantastic new releases
from Kacey Musgraves and Vince
Staples, two fast-rising stars in
country and hip hop, respectively.
It might seem odd to see
Musgraves and Staples in the
same sentence, because their
music doesn’t even seem to inhabit
the same world. But I wanted
to write about them both in the
same column today because, even
though their genres and aesthetics
are wildly different, as I’ve been
listening to their albums, I’m
finding that I like each one for
strangely similar reasons. Both of
these records are great because
their artists use songwriting as a
way to represent their cultures and
bring you into their worlds.
For me, Vince Staples’s
Summertime ’06 was a hotly
anticipated release. The 21-year-
old has come up on a wave of
hype after associations with Mac
Miller and Odd Future, with
Summertimemarking his official
debut release. Clams Casino and
the now-legendary No I.D. do their
part on production by throwing
swirling dark clouds over every
track, but Staples owns this record
alone with his words and voice.
Much like Kendrick Lamar on
good kid, m.A.A.d city, Staples
takes his introduction to a mass
audience as an opportunity to
recreate the streets from which
he came. But while Lamar colored
the bleak violence of Compton
with huge, radio-ready choruses
and songs that were legitimately
fun to listen to, Staples sounds
like he’s rapping in an isolated
post-apocalyptic wasteland.
These aren’t party anthems;
they’re sober reflections and
un-sugarcoated truths.
Staples creates the scenes of
his youth with an astoundingly
mature touch. As Shayan Shafii
wrote last week, Staples takes
a page from guys like 2Pac and
Kendrick by playing the survivor
role and telling the stories of his
friends who didn’t make it out.
Staples details almost all of the
struggles that face Black men
growing up in the ’hood — police,
racism, poverty, violence and drug
addiction. He grapples with his
newfound status, with being the
rich outsider in his neighborhood
and playing shows to white crowds
while knowing how little has
changed where he’s from. This
record is not an enjoyable, breezy
listen, but it contains valuable
insights about American life that
everyone should hear.
On the other hand, while I was
ready to hear Summertime ’06 the
day it came out, I count myself as a
member of the notorious “anything
but country” music fan clique. So
I’ll admit that Kacey Musgraves
was nowhere near my radar until
soon after her sophomore major-
label release, Pageant Material
came out a few weeks ago. And
the easy explanation for why she
seemed to very suddenly reach
my ears is because Musgraves
doesn’t sound like modern country
music. She’s found acceptance
in indie-rock and hipster circles
because her acoustic arrangements
and quieter reflections are a far
cry from the booze-and-chicks
anthems of guys like Jason Aldean
and Luke Bryan.
Any record with small acoustic
arrangements and vocal-heavy
songs is going to be judged
primarily on its lyrics, and
Musgraves has plenty of great
ones. Her songs range from down-
home perkiness (“Cup of Tea”) to
quietly, lovingly reflective (“Late to
the Party”), but they all undeniably
have Musgraves’ personal stamp
of self-deprecation and trail blazer
mentality. There’s an obvious
twang in practically every note, but
fans of indie singer-songwriters
should never be too uncomfortable,
as Musgraves’ warmth and wit
should affect you even if you’re
strictly a hardcore hip-hop head.
It’s been weird for me, alternating
between the two of these albums
since I discovered them, because
it’s hard to imagine two works of
art more culturally or sonically
divergent. Though commercial
country music does owe a certain
debt to hip-hop, Musgraves and
Staples are both operating outside
their genres’ modern radio sounds.
Musgraves is acoustic, traditional
and timeless, with her work
serving as a callback to fierce
iconoclastic country personalities
of old while also creating a new,
relevant one for today’s world.
Staples, meanwhile, has made an
album almost completely bereft
of the glamour, opulence and
escapism that a lot of radio hip hop
plays up. This is the last album
you would ever expect to be called
Summertime — Future’s hook on
“Señorita” is the brightest things
ever get, and even that sounds
like a ghostly approximation of
Future’s typical all-out energy.
But even though they both stay
away from certain genre clichés,
Musgraves and Staples songs are
fiercely proud to represent The
South and South Central LA,
respectively, and I can’t imagine
two more different places in
America for an artist to come from.
Occasionally, though, Musgraves
and Staples fall into the worst traps
of their styles of music. A couple of
the obvious singles on Musgraves
album (“Biscuits” and “Family Is
Family”) are wall-to-wall filled
with the most clichéd down-home
sayings you can imagine (like
“I burned my own damn finger
poking someone else’s fire”). The
lines are cute and old-school on
their own, like something your
grandma might say, but all together
they can come off as pandering
and incongruous with the rest of
<Pageant Material. Staples, for his
part, can’t quite acquit himself of
mainstream hip-hop misogyny by
including women in his narrative
only as nameless “bitches” and
“hoes.” Staples probably deserves
a pass here because he’s expertly
recreating a world he inhabited
when he was only an immature 12
years old, but in general, I’ve been
wishing since To Pimp a Butterfly
for a major hip hop record to tell
stories of “life in the ’hood” from
a woman’s perspective. However,
the onus shouldn’t be on Staples to
deliver that — and I’m glad it’s not,
because Staples really isn’t good
at telling women’s stories (see the
at-least-eyebrow-raising second
verse of “Surf,” in which he seems
to be guilt-tripping a young girl
choosing to have an abortion).
But obviously, none of these flaws
come anywhere near sinking
their respective records. I love
both of them, even if they sound
weird back to back. Musgraves
has gone back to the past to
create a new model for a 21st
century country music star with
her reflective, independent and
feminist melodies, while Staples
has fearlessly embraced his role as
fearless social critic, philosopher
and torch-bearer in a chaotic and
uncertain world — both incredible
feats for artists still in the early
stages of their careers. But both of
these records are especially great,
regardless of genre or where they
come from, because of the bare
humanity laid out in each of them.
Neither Musgraves nor Staples
is perfect — and, well, you’re
delusional if you expect them to
be — but they’re both sharing their
personal stories. If an artist simply
has the courage to invite you into
his or her world, that deserves
respect; but if he or she does it with
as much intelligence and skill as
Musgraves and Staples, it demands
attention. Even if you normally
never listen to their style of music,
give Musgraves and Staples a shot
and step into their worlds.
Theisen is now reconsidering
country music. To stop him,
e-mail ajtheis@umich.edu
ADAM
THEISEN
Vince Staples, Kacey Musgraves
and the art of storytelling