![]() ![]() He payed tribute to his dynamic essence in “AM//Radio” and “Off-Top,” tracks stuffed with murky undertones, bellowing electronic chords, and a general sense of fear, uncanniness, and the darkness that chewed up the rapper previously. ![]() ![]() Otherwise, an Earl Sweatshirt show is just him, his sounds, and his words. He kept his presentation simple, sporting a white graphic T-shirt, sipping on a red Solo cup, and pacing in front of a screen flashing visuals of an orange sunset with black trees, a lit match, a sparked joint, and two images of himself: one as a child, and one depicting him contemporarily. He’s been through the ringer, but he won’t let it squeeze him into dust. “Bend, we don’t break/ We not the bank,” he intoned on “The Bends,” a promise as much to himself as his audience. That’s a skill deserving just as much time in the limelight as his poetic statements. Earl had a more prominent influence in the creation of the sounds off his latest work, on which he produced more than half of the tracks. Earl’s gloomy, monotone vocals, however, incorporate the same aptitude.ĭuring this part of the show, the beats were so loud they often swallowed his words. Splintered guitar plucks, abyssal bass, and the old-timey samples that consume the new, 25-minute album are a diversion from the dark production surrounding sophomore release I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside. The MC soon shifted sounds, new tracks “Ontheway!,” “The Bends,” and “Azucar” flowing one into the other seamlessly and leaving little time for the audience to even realize he’d moved on. “Earl is not my name,” he explained during “Veins,” with its gurgling distortion. The tour title alone – Thebe Kgositsile Presents: Fire It Up, A Tour Starring Earl Sweatshirt & Friends – and this year’s third album, Some Rap Songs, shows he’s moving away from the foundational aspects of all that comes with being “Earl Sweatshirt.” “Molasses” drips a gritty commentary on everything from his struggles with marijuana to women over a reformative, jagged jazz creation taken from Lennie Hibbert’s 1969 track “Rose Len.” The rapper’s sadness clings to him like a cloak, but his delivery makes it seem more like a cape.Īs such, a crowd of some 500 strong hung onto the edge of every word while spitting it right back in his face – out of true respect, of course. reared and based, the 25-year-old Odd Future collective member began with a RZA collab from his debut studio LP, 2013’s Doris. Earl Sweatshirt at Emo’s, May 1 (Photo by David Brendan Hall)Ĭhicago born and L.A. ![]()
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