The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Thursday, September 5, 2019 — 5

Somewhere on a dingy, pale-
blue sofa in a poorly lit room, 
BROCKHAMPTON 
is 
situated 
before 
your 
screen 
in 
silvery 
jumpsuits. 
Their 
quintessential 
Cheeto-dust 
orange 
garb 
and 
cheesy smiles are supplanted by 
somber, subdued semi-dancemoves 
and emotionally raw lyricism. This 
is their latest album GINGER at 
its overarching emotional core, 
“Dearly Departed.” 
An obvious sly at former vocalist 

Ameer Vann’s departure from the 
band in May 2018, the video depicts 
current 
members 
breaking 
the 
fourth wall as though speaking to 
a particular person. Kevin Abstract 
kicks off this intervention deadpan, 
staring into the eyes of the viewer 
as he spits his verse about betrayal 
and backstabbing, only to leave 
the scene immediately after he’s 
finished. From that point on, the 
music video centers on every 
member in the scene as they bare 
their heartbreak and pain from a 
different point of view. It pans out 
as Joba belts out the high notes in 
the chorus and collapses. It zooms 

in on Matt as he reads his verse 
from notecards only to tear them 
apart and abandon the track that’s 
still playing — Merlyn is in this 
cut but says absolutely nothing, 
sobered. And Dom gets up close and 
personal, punching the camera as 
he describes a situation in which a 
“friend” of his set up another friend 
to get robbed. Conducted in a single 
take, the nuances of the video stand 
out, from the panning in and out of 
the camera to the eye contact of the 
members to the actions they take as 
they sing their verses.
The art of this video pins itself 
in symbolism, every action directed 
towards the camera as though it’s an 
actual person. This emphasizes that 
any beef in the room is not among 
the bandmates but between the 
group and someone else in the room. 
They’re together in the emotional 
battle between BROCKHAMPTON 
and this other person. Ameer 
Vann is never explicitly brought 
up, but given the lyrical content, 
the unity of the members and the 
emotionally 
unhinged 
gestures, 
BROCKHAMPTON makes it clear 
that Vann is no longer welcome and 
has left deep, vulnerable scars in 
their lives.

‘Dearly Departed’: A sobering
group message to Ameer Van

Post Malone released the fourth single, 
“Circles,” from his upcoming album 
Hollywood Bleeding on Aug. 30, following 
in the footsteps of the wildly successful 
“Sunflower” and the regularly successful 
“Wow.” and “Goodbyes.” 
In many respects, “Circles” is the 
same old Post. His vocals are lovelorn, 
shot through with powerful vibrato. The 
chorus is an instant earworm, the type 
upon which Post built and maintained 
his fame. The structure is about as 
straightforward as it gets, and there’s not 
much in the way of experimentation or 
risk in any respect. 
However, Post makes some interesting 
departures from his traditional sound. 
The use of a bright round-string bass 
line (a great one, at that) as opposed to 
his typical electronic 808s is perhaps 
the most notable. The sonic palette as a 

whole seems to be heavily influenced by 
psychedelic pop (e.g. Currents), a sound 
that suits Post surprisingly well. 
“Circles” 
is 
profoundly 
catchy, 
tastefully upbeat and well-arranged. 
The bridge is on the weak side, a little 
too harmonically dependent upon the 
preceding section. Other than that, it’s 
hard to find any real problem with this 
song other than the fact that it plays it 
safe. I continue to be astounded by Post’s 
ability to churn out hit after hit — his 
sense of catchiness in melody is nonpareil 
in pop music today. Hopefully Hollywood 
Bleeding finds him continuing his hot 
streak.

Malone’s ‘Circles’ is
trippy, but plays it safe

JONAH MENDELSON
Daily Arts Writer

One of the first exercises I did in my 16th-century 
counterpoint class this semester was an identification game. 
Our professor took a famous theme from a Mozart piano piece 
and set it in six different styles. After playing each variation, he 
asked us to name the style we thought he was trying to imitate 
or the specific composer.
Going into the exercise, I thought I’d have a lot of trouble 
hearing an imitation of a famous composer from a short eight-
bar variation. I thought we might be able to guess the style 
or period of the music, maybe even the specific sub-period or 
nationality of the music, but never the specific composer.
Yet for five of the six styles, my three-person class was able to 
guess not only the style, but the specific composer our professor 
had sought to emulate. In eight bars of music based on a theme 
by an already famous composer, our professor was able to adapt 
the stylistic nuances and notational idiosyncrasies that define 
specific famous composers. And he was able to so decisively.
This got me thinking about artistic voice and artistic style. Is 
it possible to distinguish an artist’s “voice” from their “style”? 
Given that everyone probably defines these two concepts 
differently, I should clarify that I take “voice” to be an artist’s 
small technical habits that define their artistic output within 
the larger “style” of cultural context, genre and subgenre of art 
that these artists are usually defined with.
The best artists, I believe, are those whose artistic voices are 
immediately recognizable. The composers that we were talking 
about in class, for example, are some of the most prolific 
and ground-breaking composers within the classical music 

tradition that have ever lived. They’ve succeeded in cultivating 
voices that are distinctly their own even as they pushed the 
boundaries of their style.
One artist that I think best embodies this concept of a well-
defined voice is Kurt Vonnegut. I am a huge fan of Vonnegut, 
having first been introduced to him through his relatively 

comedic and light novel “The Sirens of Titan.” When we talk 
about Vonnegut’s style, we think of his background and the 
larger cultural context surrounding his work. The modern 

and postmodern periods, for example, and the World War II 
generation.
But when we talk about Vonnegut’s voice we have very few 
words or larger concepts to compare him to. Though I can’t 
articulate how I know this, I can almost always tell if I am 
reading a play, novel or short story by him. I might use some 
fancy-sounding descriptors to identify specific aspects of this 
voice — nonlinearity in time and plot, randomization surfaces 
with hidden patterns beneath them, dark humour as a means of 
expressing larger concepts — but none of these descriptors in 
sum or part capture everything that makes up his voice. Even 
within his chapters and titles, for example, one can get a clear 
sense of his artistic voice.
Vonnegut’s extremely well-defined artistic voice had a 
positive effect on his career and the perpetual success of his 
estate. A performance of “Happy Birthday, Wanda June”in 
New York City this past year, for example, garnered many more 
positive reviews than one would expect from a rarely performed 
work. Audience members and critics couldn’t help but compare 
the play to other Vonnegut works. For many, myself included, 
it was the transference of this artistic voice onto the stage, and 
not the contents of the play itself, that made the performance 
such an interesting experience.
On the other hand, as was made quite obvious in many of 
the artistic reviews this past month, a strongly-defined artistic 

voice can quickly become a liability for successful artists. Take 
for example Taylor Swift and her recent album, “Lover.”
I should start with a disclaimer that I am far from being 

well-versed in Swift’s music. But in reading some of the reviews 
of her most recent album, however, I couldn’t help but notice 
the complaint that many critics have. Her new album, while 
effectively mimicking her voice, has nothing new to offer. It 
exhibits no new ideas, no new iterations on this voice.
I can think of many other artists that have become weighed 
down by their voices. Many successful artists become 
constrained by their voice, their pathway to success.
It’s not just a unique voice, I’ve come to realize, that marks 
a successful artist. It’s also an ability to bend style to match 
this artistic voice. It’s the ability to not only be informed by the 
cultural context in which the artist creates, it’s the ability to 
bring this context and artistic voice together and allow them to 
influence each other.
The best artists are those whose artistic voices are influential 
enough to bend the stylistic realm that they occupy. And that, 
I realized, is how my class was able to so easily identify the 
composers my professor was imitating. In a world where 
Beethoven’s name is virtually synonymous with early German 
Romanticism, a piece that is distinctly early German Romantic 
is assumedly by Beethoven. And thus, in a paradoxical way, 
artistic voices are perhaps best defined when they lose all 
sense of definition, when they become so embedded in their 
larger cultural context that they can no longer be pointed to as 
a specific artist’s voice at all.

Sammy Sussman: An exploration of the strange
concurrence between an artist’s voice and style

COMMUNITY CULTURE COLUMN

It’s not just a unique voice, I’ve come to realize, that 
marks a successful artist. It’s also an ability to bend 
style to match this artistic voice. It’s the ability to 
bring this context and artistic voice together and 
allow them to influence each other.

This got me thinking about 

artistic voice and artistic style. 

Is it possible to distinguish 

an artist’s “voice” from their 

“style”?

SINGLE REVIEW
MUSIC VIDEO REVIEW

‘Circles’

Post Malone

Republic Records

From that point on, the music video 
centers on every member in the 
scene as they bare their heartbreak 
and pain from a different point of 
view.

SAMMY SUSSMAN
Daily Community Culture Columnist

BROCKHAMPTON

REPUBLIC RECORDS

DIANA YASSIN
Daily Arts Writer

