Skepta: Konnichiwa ALBUM REVIEW

The U.K. grime scene is not one that I'm well versed in, but when I saw that a new Skepta release was out, I figured I should go ahead and check it out. I mean, he and guys like Dizzee Rascal are both names that I recognize and have enjoyed in the past, plus it seems as though that style of music is preparing to make its big entrance into the American charts for the first time in a while, so might as well see what all the fuss is about. However, you have been warned, I'm no grime expert.

In any case, I liked a lot of what I heard on Konnichiwa; in fact, I love the title track/ opener, which features a banging beat and Skepta is spitting bars that mention The Matrix and how he's ready to concur the rap game; he sounds hungry and his energy is infectious. This energy also carries over to tracks like "Lyrics" and "It Ain't Safe", both of which have fantastic hooks and again, some pretty solid bars from Skepta.

There are some sort of big drawbacks to this LP however. While I love how Skepta keeps his energy up, it tends to drown out the more mellow tracks here, such as "Text Me Back" or "Corn On The Curb" both of which would have gone over better if he changed up his delivery a bit more. Also, what's with the overly long skits at the end of some of these tracks? I mean, I get that he wanted to tell a story with some of these tracks, but I don't like listening to a 2 minute outro when I'm going back through an album. These moments are okay the first time through, but are completely passable after that. And I can't deny that the track "Ladies Hit Squad" is a dud through and through; it may be someone else's cup of tea, but to me, it is grade A sleaze that has no place on an album as hard as this one.

But these problems aside fortunately didn't stop me from enjoying this album quite a bit, because the album follows this stinker with three of the best tracks on the entire project. "Numbers" proves that Pharell is at his best when he's producing bangers and "Man" and "Shutdown" are so incredibly hard, it is a wonder why a track like "Ladies Hit Squad" was even considered for the final cut.

Overall, I'd say this is an album worth paying attention to, and if the U.K. grime invasion brings us more albums of this quality, then colour me excited.

8.0/10