Music Review: Little Simz- Grey Area: The New Standard for Conscious Hip Hop
Grey Area is the latest album to come from UK artist Little Simz. I remember seeing this album come out earlier this month and kept my eye on it for a while but didn’t listen to it because I simply didn’t have time to with other stuff going on in my life. When I finally got to listening to this album, I did have some expectations going into it. I had heard some iTunes samples of some of the songs and I was liking the production and beat style that was going on. So I was hoping that maybe, just maybe, the beats that I already liked, would be found on the rest of the album. Plus I also had hope that perhaps she would then have at least a good delivery on most of these tracks that would help drive the songs even further. Not knowing much of Little Simz before made me only have some limited expectations for her style and delivery. Well not only did she blow my expectations out of the park, but she also sent my expectations to an entirely different city.
Little Simz has delivered upon to the good people of the world, a rap album that is consistently strong and incredibly performed throughout. These ten tracks that are on this album are 10 of the best songs that I have heard all year so far. Like she has put together a collection that feels like an artist’s greatest hits album, and it’s incredible.
This album starts with the song “Offence” which has a great jazz-like beat to it with some horns that come in interjectionally with the beat. Plus Simz flows on this song are watertight and phenomenal. I’m going to save some word space here and say that Little Simz performance on every single song on this album is perfect. Her flows throughout the album are always top notch and confident sounding. She becomes more and more confident sounding as the album goes on and it pays off big time on songs such as “Venom,” “101 FM”, “Therapy and “Sherbet Sunset.” I don’t know if I’ve ever heard a rapper sound so consistently on point with every bar and every line she spits on this album. At least it’s easily the best I’ve listened to this year.
The beats on this album all have some jazz influence within them. Sometimes it will be the infectious and groovy bass lines, and sometimes it could be the drums that have that typical jazz style. Either way, it gets mixed with a more modern rap sound such as on the song “Venom” where you can tell that the drums have a jazz song style but is performing a more modern rap beat. This combination creates a beat that sounds oddly unique and super satisfying to the ears. Every beat on this album could get everybody’s head bobbing almost guaranteed.
The features on here all take the role of singing a chorus on the song they are a part of, but they all nail their performances. Cleo Soul on the song “Selfish” sings the lyrics of the chorus very beautifully, and soulfully with all the intentions of making the song moodier. Chronixx on the song “Wounds” adds the more sensual feeling that the story of the song needed to get the most potential for it to have an impact on the listener. Little Dragon appears on the song “Pressure” where he gives a more moody performance which fits very well with the tone of the song. The same can even be said about Michael Kiwanuka on the song “Flowers” who works well with Little Simz to get the theme of death through to the listeners.
I could go on forever about things I loved about this album, but I rather leave a little bit for the listeners to hear for themselves. Overall this album is the best put together rap album that I’ve reviewed. The consistency of this album throughout is something you don’t hear every day, and it deserves to be heard more than it is currently. Little Simz in my opinion just raised the standards for how conscious hip hop should be done and I find it hard to believe that there will be a better rap album released this year. Actually, I would be surprised if we get another album that is this good at any point later this year. I honestly don’t think I have a choice but to give this album the score that it rightfully deserves.
10/10
