TYRON: ALBUM REVIEW
slowthai is easy to root for. Everything he presents feels authentic, and he never hesitates to talk his shit. Over the course of the last few years, he has made a name for himself as one of Britain’s most brash young voices. His 2019 album Nothing Great About Britain caught the world by surprise as he expertly blended boom-bap with grime and even some punk. On his newest project TYRON, he delivers more mellow and emotionally potent work. While in its first half, TYRON maintains the hard-hitting bangers he’s known for, the second half of the project shows slowthai reflecting on where life has put him. It’s not a happy album, but it allows you to step into slowthai’s shoes and see his struggles for what truly they are.
The album revolves around death. As slowthai says, “It always rains when it’s sunny,” which perfectly describes the mood of the album. Even when the music is bright, in each excited scream, there is also a deep sadness there. On “nhs,” an outwardly more uplifting song, slowthai delivers a touching tribute to Britain’s National Health Service. But, this tribute is littered with allusions to the death that they help prevent. The way slowthai weaves this emotion through this project is powerful and adds a unifying force to this album that I didn’t see in Nothing Great About Britain.
A lot of the album, if taken at face value, can be a bit cringey. It’s no secret that slowthai has been embroiled in a solid amount of controversy and “CANCELLED” is his weak response. The song is a banger, but lyrically, it falls short. While it’s true that certain people were dubious of some of slowthai’s past actions, he’s not relevant enough to be canceled. It’s a bit awkward hearing two guys talk about people trying to cancel them for dumb things that everyone would rather forget. But, this is part of the journey of this album. TYRON is not a project about how slowthai has found all the answers, it’s about his journey and path to getting there.
Musically, this album feels like it’s building to a specific moment that James Blake delivers on “feel away.” Putting James Blake on and hip-hop track is an immediate recipe for success, but slowthai really morphs Blake’s voice and the sample into something special. Lyrically, the final track “adhd” perfectly sums up the project. It brings us into slowthai’s confused mind. On one song, he tells us about his struggles with addiction and sickness and how often he feels like he has to “put a face-up,” which drives much of the sadness embedded in TYRON. He chooses to end the album with anger, the way that it started, which just continues to add power to his music.
TYRON is a deep and searching project that I’m going to have to sit with a lot more over the course of the coming months. slowthai reached deep into his bag for this one, and it shows how dedicated he is to continually improving his craft.