Quick Hits, Vol. 13 (Spoon, The Libertines, Common, Ab-Soul)

Spoon - They Want My Soul.  Great album.  Solid from front to back and one of my top ten from last year.  I think the thing that I most enjoy on here is that you have classic Spoon rockers like "Rent I Pay" or "Do You," but then they shift it up a little bit with the more pensive "Knock Knock Knock," and then they just throw all that out the window with the super awesome Asian-influenced "Inside Out."

Reminds me of Coldplay going all in on the EDM movement - this is outside of the Spoon playbook, but it works and is a great, relaxed groove waterfall of a song.  Outlier is a feisty rock jam as well. Excellente.

The Libertines - Up the Bracket.  Across the pond, the Libertines were hot shit for a bit.  But their frontman, Pete Doherty, just couldn't keep from spiking his veins and getting on the front page of tabloids, so they split up a few years back.  I think they may be working things out now, but I thought I'd give them a shot to see if the music lived up to the hype.  Up the Bracket was their debut, a 2002 album that was met with a good bit of critical acclaim.  They straight tear into songs - Strokes-esque sound - with a little more punk than their New York brothers.  Good rock and roll stuff.  I think "Begging" is my favorite from the album.  Too bad the guy couldn't keep his crap together.

Common - Nobody's Smiling.  Kanye and No ID's fingerprints are on the production, as usual, for Common, with soulful samples and solid beats behind them.  This one has Common using a load of collaborators (although Big Sean is the only one I am familiar with) and I think it makes the album more uneven than his last ones.  Not a bad album, but Common is definitely the better rapper and story-teller on here - "Rewind That" is a good example. "Speak My Piece" is a cool bouncing beat sampling Notorious BIG, with Common telling all about Chicago.  "Kingdom" was the lead single, and the video intro is super intense:

Important film-making!  The plight of the lady drug dealer who still likes strip clubs!  I bet Snoop from the Wire would have gone to strip clubs if she hadn't been busy using nail guns on fools.

Ab-Soul - These Days...  I wanted to check this guy out after hearing him on some other people's tracks - he is part of the same collective as Schoolboy Q and Kendrick Lamar.  Lyrically he varies between interesting and generic, but the beats he uses are dope.  For example, the banging "Hunnid Stax" with Schoolboy Q and Mac Miller is his most popular song off of this album.

Money is the answer, right?!  The beat makes you want to bounce all day, but the verses are all just dumb dope and money and getting action.  I've been thinking about this issue recently - I like this song.  Even though the lyrics are dumb, the fact is that it is fun to sometimes just jam a good beat and not worry about whether the lyrics are going to change the world.  Cool album overall, but the last track is this silly rap battle thing apparently in a room of other people, who keep oooooh'ing and ahhh'ing and psssshhh'ing as these two guys trade verses.  The verses are pretty sweet, but the people contribute their noises of pleasure at odd times.  Lame-o to them, hooray-o for the album.