Released July 15, 2016
7.5 / 10
Favorites
Cold Little Heart, Rule The World, Father's Child
Least favorites
One More Night
London-born Michael Kiwanuka was propelled on the forefront of the US music scene after "Love & Hate" came out and the HBO series 'Big Little Lies' used the magical Cold Little Heart as its theme song. Here to set the record straight for an album that has much more to offer beyond the first track - albeit one of the brightest gems on the album. Despite its tendency to skim the surface of critical subject matters instead of deep-diving, "Love & Hate"'s dense musical prowess is a statement of its own. Alongside Kiwanuka, Danger Mouse (Brian Burton - one half of Gnarls Barkley with Cee-Lo Green and Broken Bells with Shins frontman James Mercer) and Inflo handle production masterfully, filling up the space created by the musical arrangements. "Love & Hate"'s principal flaw resides in the under-development of far-reaching lyrical content. Falling is a striking example of the lack of substantial lyrics, that distract from the build-up and the beautiful addition of strings on a backdrop of church organs and electric guitar. The title track, Love & Hate also disappoints in this respect, especially because the sonics are not sufficiently audacious to make up for it. The song loses its listener, as a combination of several tame - and dare I say, uneventful - sounds that need more dissection and work. Its intro is solid - a recurrent feature of tracks on "Love & Hate" - but the rest of the song doesn't command much attention. Nevertheless, the Sahara of lyrical content is none other than One More Night. Don't hope to find poetic or even material wording in One More Night, a distilled sounding track that calls The Black Keys to mind. I will say that the one song on which the simple lyrics play in favor of the overall impact of the track is Black Man In A White World. With an intro we would expect from people of the stature of Nina Simone, this matter-of-fact tune wraps its message beautifully in a powerful interplay with a choir and the repeated hammering of the title (more than 40 times!). Even though the lyrical content is, by and large, dry and scarce, the melodies are mostly lush and vibrant. Many songs on "Love & Hate" are journeys of their own. Father's Child's plea resonates intensely by virtue of a dense musical fabric. The not-so-predictable arrival of strings, the shivering choir, the contrast between the dirty guitar and the clean piano motif, along with the ambient electronic sound heighten the track to remarkable levels. And no review of "Love & Hate" would be complete without a well-deserved nod to Cold Little Heart. Yet another otherworldly intro - that doesn't feel forced, nor overworked or overly complicated. This grand opening to the album is a bit of a triptych homage to the orchestral rock classics of the 70s. Anyway you hear it, it's hard to pull away from the gravitational pull of its sound. Kiwanuka's story on "Love & Hate" is one of struggle. The most evident form this inner struggle takes is the inability to juggle feelings of loneliness and independence. The tensions between raising walls and breaking them down permeates the album. With this in mind, I'll Never Love delightfully stitches up fears of depending on someone else, with miraculous vocals announced by the acoustic start. And after yet another majestic intro, Rule The World spins up wonderfully distorted vocals that grow more and more urgent as the track develops, supported by stringent choir chants and a growing string presence. With this song, we become fully immersed in Kiwanuka's contradictions. We find him begging for help not long after requests to be left alone. We come to the realization that whatever Kiwanuka goes through, it has to be on his own terms; and only in his most vulnerable moments he is able to relinquish the control he works hard to keep in check. Here's to hoping he has grown a better sense of loving himself and letting go the hate that is deceptively easy to accumulate in a heart.
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