New Music Friday!

Kicking this New Music Friday off with another highly anticipated album, GOLLIWOG from billy woods. Now if you recall (or don't recall), billy woods, and Armand Hammer, have been no stranger to my year end AOTY lists, going all the way back to like 2012. I have even crowned woods with the highest honor of a #1 AOTY in 2023, with his Kenny Segal-produced album, Maps. That all being said, I went into GOLLIWOG with some pretty high expectations. And now, after two full initial listens, I can say that I'm essentially left stumbling over my thoughts like I usually am after a new woods project. Stumbling in that his projects always have a ton of depth and are lyrically intellectual and layered. There's so much to wrap my mind around here! In short, I'm going to have to revisit this project MANY more times to get a full appreciation before providing an appropriate summation of my thoughts.

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What can I tell you now? Well, there is not a singular producer on this record. Rather, there is a huge lineup of production credits on this one, with the likes of Kenny Segal, The Alchemist, EL-P, DJ Haram, Shabaka Hutchings, and many others. GOLLIWOG has a runtime of about 53 minutes across 18 tracks. And what is a golliwog? You can see in the growingly unsettling album art that it is a black-faced doll. But I do know that a golliwog is seen as a offensive racist parody. Combine that with the unsettling samples and sounds throughout this album and what do we get? Horror stories through the African American lens.

There are so many standout moments throughout the 18 tracks. After only two listens, the one that stands out the most to me right now is the production used on 'Waterproof Mascara' - on this track, woods boldy raps over a sample of a woman crying over an eerie atmospheric sampling. Truly unsettling, but brilliant and unheard of. Woods' intelligence in the rap/hip-hop game is essentially unmatched. I love albums that make me think and challenge me. GOLLIWOG is a very gripping and demanding album. Again, it's going to require many revisits and lots of time. But there is definitely something special here. We'll see if it's an album that I will enjoy returning to in the future once I've had time peel back all of it's layers.

 
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