Quick Hits, Vol. 359 (Logic, Vince Staples, The Last Dinner Party, Vanilla is Black)

I had to go to Prosper, Texas last weekend for a kid's sporting event, and holy hell their high school was nice.  I remember this article telling me all about the school district and their growing pains, but seeing it in person was wild.  Nicer than my college, with amazing sports facilities.  I know it would be amazingly complicated to see, but I would actually like to know how funding goes for Texas school districts.  I get the idea behind the Robin Hood program and making sure that districts have equal funding that doesn't get them left behind.  But it would appear that some districts get filet mignon while others get ground beef, because our high school looks like a prison from a 70's sci-fi movie and theirs looked like Pepperdine.

Logic - Ultra 85.  I've defended Logic multiple times in this space, as I think he has some legitimate skill in speedily weaving cool sounding raps over interesting beats.  He can go cheesy as hell at times, and some of the skits he likes to lean into get exhausting, but overall I dig it.  As my wife and I drove a rental car through eastern Tennessee late last year, my "random" shuffle of my new music queue kept hitting tracks from this particular album, and her exhaustion because of the unrelenting pace of his raps has stuck with me ever since.  If I just hear the album opener by itself, a jazzy little ditty covered up by a speedy set of bars, I'm liking what he has going on.  But if you have to listen to an hour and seventeen minutes of this type of speed-show-off-flow, it definitely gets tiring.  And the weird skits about two spacemen dealing with robots on their ship or whatever really doesn't help.  But then one like "Deja Vu" comes on and I find myself bopping my head and enjoying the ride.  I don't know what to do with this.  "44ever" is the top track with 11 million streams.

You know you are monetizing things when under that YouTube video you can buy the U85 Elite Jumpsuit for $175 after you finish watching the video.  The interesting thing to me is that I am pretty sure that is not quite the same beat as you get on the album.  Why would they change it?  If I could eliminate all of the skits, and somehow add in some chill songs in here, this could be a good disc.

Vince Staples - Vince Staples.  When he came back to ACL last year, I realized that I had missed this 2021 disc in his catalog.  It's good stuff.  A concise (22 minutes) stack of head-nodding beats and laid back rhymes.  Feels reserved to me - there's no big track on here that was going to make the radio and the TikTok.  Album opener "Are You With That?" is the top streamer with 64.1 million streams.

See?  That is a nice little bop-along track.  You're not going to get hype with it, but you can roll your shoulders a little and groove along.  "MHM" is good, and "Sundown Town" is pretty solid too.  Not the best rap album of the year, but a fine effort.

The Last Dinner Party - Prelude to Ecstasy: Acoustics & Covers.  I feel like just the title of the album tells me all I need to know about the pretentiousness that is about to envelop my ears.  There are definitely some enjoyable bits of this album, but it is absolutely too long at 21 songs and 1:11.  And so theatrical and overwrought.  As I listen through it there are moments where I am like, "oh, okay, that sounds good!"  And then a minute later I am like "dear God when will this album finally end?"  "Nothing Matters" is the top track by a lot, and I agree.  155.7 million streams.

The chorus in this one, which comes on like a Blondie cover yanked out of the 80's, is where this one jams.  HAIM vibes too for me.  But this song really goes for the traditional rock tune structure, which is why I prefer it for sure.  A good number of the other songs on here feel more like they are trying out for Phantom with a handmade audition piece.  "Sinner" is pretty good too.  I feel like it is a foregone conclusion that these ladies will show up at ACL this year - feels like they keep adding more lady-dominated acts and this one has a little excitement behind it right now.  I'll let this go but keep my eye out to see if another album cuts down on the parts that miss it for me.

Vanilla is Black - U.Aint.Neva.Lied!  These dudes showed up last minute on the ACL poster last year, and I liked it enough to toss the whole album into my new music queue.  This disc is really enjoyable.  Parliament-style/Thundercat-esque funk, just catchy and groovy all the way down. And every time I think about their name again, I have that little blown mind moment one more time of being like, "WOAH, YEAH, IT IS!"  Peep "Mezcal" and see what you think - 151k streams.

This is one of the more aggressively paced tunes on the album, many others keep it more chill, but if that bass line doesn't get your head bobbing then I don't know what to do with you.  This gets me all sorts of wiggly.  I like that they went and rented some AirBnb in Marfa or something to shoot the video and just be chill.  Also, the triple hammock hanger move is tight.  Very much enjoy this one.