slowthai – TYRON

At last year’s NME Awards, slowthai was one of the biggest highlights. He was nominated for several categories and won the “Hero of the Year” award. But, it was when he went to the stage to accept it that everything started to go the wrong way. During his speech, he said to host and comedian Katherine Ryan, “Baby girl… if you want to do something, see me later… you ain’t never had anyone play with you like I’ll play with you.” Quickly the audience accused him and his joke of misogyny. In response, slowthai didn’t like the accusations and started to discuss with the public, what led to him throwing some liquid at them and then jump from the stage. His biggest night became his worst nightmare. 

But, the worst was yet to come. After the ceremony, when the video of slowthai began to circulate through the internet, slowthai started to be “canceled.” His condemnation was massive and immediate. On the next morning, he apologized for his behavior, received support from Ryan, and returned the “Hero” award. Since then, he didn’t release any more songs and stayed in isolation for almost a year. As well as cruel, that time was good for him to think about everything that had happened. TYRON, British rapper sophomore record, arrives exactly one year after the last year’s incident. Even if the intentions were good, the album is far from the expected and is almost no ideal.

Just like what happened with Iggy Azalea in 2019, when her album In My Defense, instead of being a kind of excuse and acknowledgment of guilt for her previous behavior, was a kind of set of defense attacks, the same happens with TYRON and slowthai. “This album was created during a difficult time in my life, I am far from perfect but I’ve learnt a lot about myself whilst creating this album and I will continue to grow into a better person for myself and aim to be a reflection of what I want to see in this world,” he said on Instagram. However, instead of recognizing his guilt, understanding the problem, and redeeming himself, showing maturity, he spends much of the album just victimizing himself, talking about the people who like to attack him and how they all make mistakes. Indeed, we all make mistakes, but that doesn’t mean that everyone can apologize properly. 

TYRON is slip in two halves of seven tracks each: the first is composed of track in caps lock, representing the anger, madness, and slowthai’s aggressive voice; the second one, in lower-case, is gentler, with a soft mix of pop, trap, and rap/hip-hop. Unfortunately — and ironically — the one with more potential, the first, is the weakest, this being the center of the most boring, superficial, and predictable songs on the album. It is in the half that slowthai acts like he’s never done anything wrong, looking more concerned with attacking people who judged him with catchphrases than actually looking at himself and recognizing that he did something wrong. Take “CANCELLED” as an example, where Skepta sings, “How you gonna cancel me?/Twenty awards on the mantelpiece.” It’s almost like If he was using awards to justify that they don’t deserve being repressed for their bad behavior. In other words, the moment he most needed to look at himself, he looked at others. 

Thankfully, the production on this first half is pretty great. Even though it’s kinda generic with every track sounding almost the same and also looking like something we’ve heard before, still pretty well-mixed and well-directed. While the opener, “45 SMOKE,” sounds frightening, which makes sense with the whole context, the collaboration with A$AP Rocky, “MAZZA,” is really nice and entertaining with simpler and softer instrumentation that contrasts very well with the great layered vocal work. Lastly, “DEAD,” is the highest point of this half, with the most catchy sonority, which is composed of shooting synthesizers and synth voices, and the best slowthai’s vocal performance, which sounds free. Fortunately, from now on, TYRON only gets better. 

Although in the second half the rapper still does not admit the guilt and understand the problems that everyone pointed out, he manages to show more intimate tracks, which seem to have themes that may be difficult for slowthai to debate. In “i tried,” for example, he talks about his addictions to drugs and alcohol while an alien voice resonates in the background, “I tried to die (The pain won’t die)/I tried to take my life.” But the deepest of all is “feel away,” with James Blake and Mount Kimbie, a tribute for slowthai’s dead brother. Although Blake did not deliver anything relevant or interesting and Kimbie was well overshadowed, everyone managed to deliver a very beautiful track, which seems to be a hundred percent coming from the heart.

Furthermore, while the production of the first half was limited and generic, the sonority of the second one is bolder, being the most different sound that slowthai has released so far. Although “terms,” with Dominic Fike and Denzel Curry, is the most generic of the entire record, it still sounds very fun and catchy. In the meantime, “push” features Deb Never’s vocals that sound almost angelic, embellishing very well with the sound of the music and slowthai’s vocals, and “nhs” features the rapper singing stripped down to beats that seem to mix ready-made sounds with subtle piano solos and vocal samples. Even “feel away,” which, as already mentioned, presents something not very interesting or new, mainly coming from Blake, manages to be that improbable piece inside an album like this that ends up fitting almost perfectly.

Unfortunately, the album doesn’t close as well as it could. The last track, “adhd,” despite being the closest moment where slowthai seems to show real concern to redeem itself with what happened to the NME, talking about his hyperactivity and impulsivity, the song ended up getting a bit faded within the album. Along with these, we can quote “VEX,” “WOT,” “PLAY WITH FIRE,” and “focus,” all of which, despite their positive points, end up being forgettable. Lastly, for better or worse, TYRON is a good album, even if not for the right reasons.