Bear Necessities is a fantastic grime album released at the genre's highest peak that demonstrates how excellent grime albums can be to naysayers that feel it should be limited to sets and singles. Bearman is entertaining and creative for the full duration of the album, including the bonus tracks, yet he doesn't stray away from grime for one moment. Let's look at why this is so great.
This album's comparable to Boy in Da Corner in the sense that not all the songs are actually 140 bmp, yet they still sound and feel grime. Some songs knock the tempo up or down a bit, not because Bearman wanted to rap, but just because the tempo suits the mood of the track, and it still maintains the hype. Take Damn for instance, no one could say that song isn't grime, yet it's much slower and allows Bearman to slow down his flow and mix up the pace of the album a bit. It works very well, just as Boy in Da Corner does. However, the Dizzee Rascal comparison ends there. Bearman bleeds with individual personality, he has a big, fun, bubbly, entertaining vibe about himself, and allows his bear personna to leak into a bunch of the songs without becoming a gimmick. Another example of a fantastic grime MC, individuality is very important, Bearman's unique and distinctive without purposely alienating himself for the sake of being different.
The beat selection is fantastic, and is comprised of exclusive riddims by mostly no name producers. I don't know who the hell a lot of these guys are but I wanna hear more. We also have a set of really great hooks, giving a lot of these songs potential to be a top 40 hit without compromising the grittiness. Not all the way through, songs like the single Drinking Beer feature an MC-only hook, but songs like So Outrageous, Bring U Down and Brown Bear Picnic are mad catchy yet still vey grimey. Every riddim has BASS, bass that any grime fan would approve of.
So Bearman's great, beats and hooks are great, what else? Well, we get features from cockney greats Fender and Bruza, funky legend Donae'o and a young female MC Lioness he mentored for a while, and a few other strong lyrical cats (Drastik's especially hard). And there's five great bonus tracks including classics like Swingers and Duppy (Doin It Again) and these feature even more five-star MCs - Wiley, Jammer, Skepta, JME, Trim, Footsie, Doctor, Shizzle, Mike Skinner...can't complain about that, even if the lyrics to Duppy are as basic as can be it's a scene classic that cannot be denied. The album isn't necessarily perfect, Drink It for instance is a bit of a weird misstep, but I can hardly complain when the rest of the material is this strong. Looking for a great and consistant grime album that doesn't fall into a lot of the trappings that full-lengths from veterans can, then you can't go wrong with Bear Necessities.
This album's comparable to Boy in Da Corner in the sense that not all the songs are actually 140 bmp, yet they still sound and feel grime. Some songs knock the tempo up or down a bit, not because Bearman wanted to rap, but just because the tempo suits the mood of the track, and it still maintains the hype. Take Damn for instance, no one could say that song isn't grime, yet it's much slower and allows Bearman to slow down his flow and mix up the pace of the album a bit. It works very well, just as Boy in Da Corner does. However, the Dizzee Rascal comparison ends there. Bearman bleeds with individual personality, he has a big, fun, bubbly, entertaining vibe about himself, and allows his bear personna to leak into a bunch of the songs without becoming a gimmick. Another example of a fantastic grime MC, individuality is very important, Bearman's unique and distinctive without purposely alienating himself for the sake of being different.
The beat selection is fantastic, and is comprised of exclusive riddims by mostly no name producers. I don't know who the hell a lot of these guys are but I wanna hear more. We also have a set of really great hooks, giving a lot of these songs potential to be a top 40 hit without compromising the grittiness. Not all the way through, songs like the single Drinking Beer feature an MC-only hook, but songs like So Outrageous, Bring U Down and Brown Bear Picnic are mad catchy yet still vey grimey. Every riddim has BASS, bass that any grime fan would approve of.
So Bearman's great, beats and hooks are great, what else? Well, we get features from cockney greats Fender and Bruza, funky legend Donae'o and a young female MC Lioness he mentored for a while, and a few other strong lyrical cats (Drastik's especially hard). And there's five great bonus tracks including classics like Swingers and Duppy (Doin It Again) and these feature even more five-star MCs - Wiley, Jammer, Skepta, JME, Trim, Footsie, Doctor, Shizzle, Mike Skinner...can't complain about that, even if the lyrics to Duppy are as basic as can be it's a scene classic that cannot be denied. The album isn't necessarily perfect, Drink It for instance is a bit of a weird misstep, but I can hardly complain when the rest of the material is this strong. Looking for a great and consistant grime album that doesn't fall into a lot of the trappings that full-lengths from veterans can, then you can't go wrong with Bear Necessities.
No comments:
Post a Comment