Review Summary: Fuck the apocalypse, I'll keep on dancing, darling.
We live in a turbulent era. Everything we do or say eventually turns political. Just go to any dinner party with the intention to play Pictionary, you will end up arguing about the geopolitical obscurity between Israel and Palestine. Have a family reunion and start counting down until your uncle or someone says something about the epicentre of Syrian war being “conveniently placed where Russian and American oil pipelines lie, look that *** up, son.” And oh my god, when will it stop？ The ever cheerful English singer-songwriter Lookman Adekunle Salami, however, much like he always had the tendency to do, decided to always look at the bright side of life.
That is not to say that this album is devoid of politics or social commentary, in fact, it consists mainly of all that. It’s that Lookman always presents it not ideologically, as others often do, but rather as a means of acknowledging the worldly situation we are in today. He doesn’t shy away from criticising or praising certain ideas or worldviews, but he never makes this album a statement-gathering political whore serving only his own personal viewpoint that disregards anyone else’s just slightly deviating from it.
The biggest credit to making this album as relaxed in the face of aggression and naturally divisive theme goes to the music. See, in order to make it as nonchalant or as unprovocative as possible, Lookman dug deep into his positivity vault and rock up with the most upbeat and whimsical arrangement, production and song-writing for a political album there ever was. If ignoring the lyrics, songs like “Who’s Cursing Us Now?” or “Terrorism! (The ISIS Crisis)” came come off almost as children music, what with their easy-going vibes and incredibly sweet catchy tunes. You might disagree with his positions, but the smoothness and the happy-go-lucky approach to musicianship simply negates any resentment and aggression (read: butthurt) you might feel.
Another admirable aspect of the album is the multitude of influences all moderately appropriated to the general happiness and instrumental aesthetic Lookman is going for. There is that good old joyful side of classic indie rock, sprinkled by the moods of blues and swing, instrumentally arranged like a folk album with deep gospel infusion, and sometimes even written as something punk-ish (again, turned milder and prettier to fit the ethos).
So if one cannot escape the natural politicisation of everything in the world, at least one could approach it with the full bliss and optimism, instead of defensiveness. At least try to get swayed by a song criticising the inland socio-political problems of the UK in style of Monthy Python like on “England is Unwell”. That’ll cheer you up for sure.
Cheers, you sweet people.
