"He's so good," says Tyler, who has finished eating and is sitting, legs outstretched, on the table. The group's totemic outlaw figure, the Sid Vicious to Tyler's Johnny Rotten, only blazingly talented, Earl is currently in a facility for wayward youth in Samoa chants of "Free Earl!" are commonplace at OF gigs. What impresses most is the witty intricacy of the rhymes as the appallingly articulate (and, it has to be said, furiously funny) rapper, 16 when he recorded it, moves from one repugnant scene to another. In this writer's opinion it is one of the best rap albums ever made, free or otherwise.Įarl is an even more sick (in both senses) attraction, with its buzzing synths like drills in an abattoir made all the more menacing by the almost facetiously pretty melodies. There is misogynous loathing of the most extreme kind, and there is suicidal despair, all wrapped up in murderous tunes and expressed in that viscous growl, like Rakim with all the nutritional elements removed. Bastard is ghoulish, but it's also rather gorgeous, with its stark piano lines and pillowy keyboards. Then there are the three Odd Future compilations (The Odd Future Tape Vol 1, Radical and Some OF Shit) that have hinted at what OFWGKTA are capable of, and the two solo works that have made it explicit: Tyler's Bastard and Earl by Earl Sweatshirt. There are two albums by the Jet Age Of Tomorrow, who specialise in light'n'breezy cosmic lounge funk two collections of by turns psychotic and psychedelic crunk by MellowHype two albums of hi-tech latterday G-funk by Mike G some blunted beats and experimental studio play courtesy of Domo Genesis even a suite of exquisite R&B with soul-baring lyrics from Frank Ocean. Forget "mixtapes", these are fully realised works sample-free, each meticulously crafted and worthy of major label release. Over the past 18 months, the eight rapping and recording-artist members of OFWGKTA (a collective that also includes producers and illustrators), have made more than a dozen albums available for free download. For sustained and diverse brilliance, only the Wu-Tang Clan with their numerous side projects come close, and even they weren't this precocious (Odd Future are aged 17-23) or prolific. Even the none-more-cool crowd went wild, a scene repeated at two rammed OF appearances at Village Underground and the Camden Crawl.Īnd you should hear their records. Suddenly, Syd cut in an OF track and, out of nowhere, the three jolted into life and began moving manically as though they'd been cattle-prodded across the room. Tyler and OF mates Left Brain and Hodgy Beats were there, sitting in the background, holding court. At YoYo in Notting Hill last week, London's most glamorous – as well as Adele, the xx, Mark Ronson, and Jamie Reynolds of Klaxons – turned up just to watch OF's in-house engineer Syd Tha Kyd do a DJ set. There's a good reason for the ubiquity: OFWGKTA are astonishing, both on record and live, where they approximate the combined imagined force of the Sex Pistols, Slipknot and NWA. Well, you could, but you'd have to not use the internet and not read any press. You can't really ignore Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All.
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