What's the Portuguese for Banger?

I've been at my new job five months now, so I should probably stop calling it a new job. I thought I had the pulse of the place, used to the rhythm and flux of a large office (I used to work with about 10 people).

Then Love Island started and I was lost. And now we're gearing up for a workplace World Cup. I'm sure you're oh-so-familiar with such things but this is my first. My team got Portugal. Talk turned to how we were gonna decorate. That Cristiano Ronaldo statue will feature prominently and I'd like to get that Nuno Valente Panini sticker involved but after that? Madeira cake, port and Portuguese man o'wars have been mentioned. Sadly Nando's is out...

Ooops, we're actually South African...

— Nando's (@NandosUK) June 7, 2018

But we might come up trumps when it comes to a soundtrack. Turns out Nelly Furtado's parents are from Portugal. Tenuous but we'll take it...

What's the Portuguese for Banger?

Related post: Imperial Timbaland

Oh Me & Oh My

Well behind the curve on this one (I hear Kanye is releasing a new album too). André 3000 uploaded two tracks on the US version of Mother's Day a couple of weeks ago. Look Ma No Hands is a 17-minute astral jazz workout with James Blake on piano and André 3000 honking away on a bass clarinet. One spin is enough.

However I cannot stop playing Me&My (To Bury Your Parents). It's a simple soul song driven by an irresistible piano line and gut-punches of emotion. It's been known that André 3000 struggles with the loss of his mother in 2013 and his father the following year. Perhaps Me&My (To Bury Your Parents) is a way of processing the grief. Maybe it was creating as an act of veneration and honour. Whatever the reason, I'm grateful that André 3000 did it. It's just beautiful. And what a debut too, as this is technically his first solo single and EP outside of OutKast.

Benin Buzz

Another month, another Buzz review.

I got a stream to Benin City's latest album for June's magazine. It's called Last Night, it's out on Moshi Moshi and it's alright like. My review is slightly more in-depth (only slightly) and I gave it three stars. Will post it when it gets published.

In the meantime here's one of the singles off the album, which sums up the album pretty well in tone and topic.

Related post: Cultural Tourism 2.0 - Benin

Original image by  Rei-artur  pt  en  Rei-artur blog [GFDL, CC-BY-SA-3.0 or CC BY-SA 2.5], via Wikimedia Commons

Update: My review of Last Night by Benin City is up on Buzz now.

Hi, How Are You Blinky?

Bought this while half-cut on Saturday from Possum Print. Only a fiver, so all good.

15-year-old Sam would have been tamping though. While I know of Daniel Johnston, I'd not listened to Hi, How Are You. I had bought a music t-shirt without being a big fan of the musician. For some reason this used to bother me. I remember getting worked up seeing a Motorhead t-shirt for sale in Topshop. Sorry, that should be Motörhead, can't forgot the metal umlaut. I don't give a shit about Motörhead now and gave even less of one then. God knows my I was mad at it. And I'm sure I bought a Gene t-shirt for £1 in the Virgin Megastore in the Capitol Centre around the same time.

I've always been a hypocrite.

Anyway I decided to give Hi, How Are You a spin... and it's good. I can hear why it has a cult following. But I can't hear myself spinning it in the car, y'know? Still, I bought the t-shirt more for The Simpsons side of things. Plus I got the Frank Ocean one previously.

As a quick aside, looking up Daniel Johnston got me on to one of my favourite activities of an evening. And that’s falling into a Wikihole. Turns out Daniel Johnston was lumped in with the New Sincerity scene and from there I went everywhere.

GWTF 21: This Is America

Go With The Flow returns with something that's everywhere.

Childish Gambino's This Is America feels like a moment. Watercooler. Ubiquitous.

#1 on trending on YouTube. The commentariat kicking up and continuing with the think-pieces. The Genius breakdown of the lyrics becoming the quickest to hit a million pageviews. The WatchMojo Top 5 Things You Didn’t Notice in Childish Gambino’s “This Is America” Video video. The inevitable point-missing memes (yes there's dank Simpsons ones). The satire...

“He smokes a joint in it, which was really brave. I’m, like, all for legalization.”

A post shared by The Hard Times (@thehardtimesnews) on May 7, 2018 at 3:02pm PDT

They were even discussing it on BBC Radio 4 when I drove to work on Tuesday.

It's everywhere and it should be.

And there's gonna be a lot of documentaries made in the future trying to explain what we're going through now. And This Is America will feature heavily. Race, violence, distraction, chaos, confusion. Donald Glover might have the hop on the future doc-makers.

And for all the discussions around it, not enough has been said about what a banger it is.

My one thing though - and stop reading as I could ruin it for you - is towards the end of the second verse. The "Hunnid bands, hunnid bands, hunnid bands." This Is America joins John Foxx's Underpass in songs where I only hear Underpants. Underpants, underpants, underpants.

Did I write a quick blog on Childish Gambino's Important-with-a-capital-I track to share my underpants problem? Maybe. Should I check my privilege? Yeah, probably.

Still a banger though.

Original image by Theshibboleth [GFDL or CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons