Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By ILOVEMAKONNEN, Warner Records 2019.
IloveMakonnen is an American Grammy nominated multi-platinum singer, rapper, and hip-hop artist who is seen as a bit of a musical maverick for the way he creates a patchwork of indie, hip-hop, and alternative sounds in his songs.
This is the first EP of his work that I’ve listened to and I find it much more interesting than straight rap, hip-hop and alternative music.
Firstly, he sings a good percentage of the songs and he has a good voice, secondly the rapped/hip-hop sections are delivered at a pace that make the words discernible and thirdly the infusion of indie/alternate musical forms provides much more interest than the individual genres do on their own.
IloveMakonnen (Makonnen Sheran) first came to prominence in 2014 when Canadian rapper, Drake, released a re-worked version of Sheran’s song Tuesday from his first self-titled EP.
The success of that track led to the release of a second EP in 2015, ILOVEMAKONNEN 2, and tracks from his two EPs started to appear on compilations and garner some radio time.
After a fall-out with Drake’s label he spent some time self-releasing before signing a deal with the major label Warner Records. M3 is the first release of this partnership and I expect many more will follow.
All the songs on the EP are short and they’re varied in their musical forms.
I love the opening track, Liquid Supply Daily, with its sparse guitar introduction. This track is remarkably catchy and it also highlights Makonnen’s excellent voice.
It’s not often that I listen to a hip-hop album more than once but such is the musical inventiveness of ILoveMakonnen that I found myself doubling back to listen to selected tracks multiple times.
This surely reveals a lot about the quality of this particular release.
The purists might question his bowerbird approach to music but I like what he’s doing.
