Music Recap: JUNE

0 Monday July 4 2011 Written by flyprints
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Yet another month has passed, seriously now I know this is what all old people say but, WHERE has this year gone? We’re already half way through?!!

Anyway… back to the music, this month I decided to feed you with some new releases from June. We’ve got new material from Beyonce, Jesse Boykins III, SBTRKT + more. Read on!

Beyonce – 4
This album is a great piece of work from Queen Bey, production wise, songwriting wise, vocal ability wise Beyonce nails it! It consists of a good mix of ballards and party tunes and I like the fact it isn’t ridden with features, Andre 3000 being the only one on the track ‘Party’ which has had @JeffFLYPRINTS fully gassed for a couple of weeks now.

The lead single to this album was ‘Run The World’ and is now followed by the second single ‘Best I Never Had’. Personally, the tracks that stand out for me are ‘End of Time’, the production on this is SPLENDIFOROUS (It’s so good I had to make up a word to accommodate for it), and then also ‘Start Over’ and ‘Love on Top’. If you ever doubted or were even unaware of Beyonce’s work ethos and drive to achieve the best she possible can then firstly, SLAP YO’SELF, and secondly make sure you watch her documentary on the making of this album HERE.

Here is one of my favorite tracks from 4, “End Of Time”:

Jesse Boykins III – Way Of A Wayfarer
For those of you who don’t know Jesse Boykins III (JB3) is a very talented singer/songwriter/producer from New York and has recently released a new mixtape. If I’m completely honest, on first listen I wasn’t entirely impressed, it had a completely different sound to what I was expecting, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. So I gave it a second listen and had an entirely different experience. This time through it consisted of smooth vocals on top of electronic easy listening styled beats, it is definitely a chilled out listen. The first half of the mixtape definitely had more promise than the second and the track that stood out to me was “Back Home (Mermaids & Dragons)”. But download the mixtape for yourself HERE

Here is my favorite track “Back Home (Mermaids and Dragons)”:

SBTRKT – SBTRKT
SBTRKT is a masked producer from London, never showing his face in performances. And if i’m being completely honest, that is about all I know about this mysterious dude (whats the chances that he is actually the masked graffiti artists Banksy – have you ever seen either of them in the same place at the same time… I might be onto something here!!?). But what I DO know is that he released an album last month and it is getting some serious playtime in my life. It it largely an instrumental album which I consider a really brave move in todays musical climate, luckily he has nothing to worry about as he pulls it off extremely well. There are plenty of times when I just prefer to listen to beats with minimal/simplistic vocals, it allows the music to be absorbed in a much more purer form as there is no distractions with lyrical content and vocals. The first single off the album is ‘Wildfire’ which is a great track but the other track that stands out for me is “Hold On”:

Other album releases from June worth checking out are:

+ Lil B – “I’m Gay (I’m Happy)”
+ Bon Iver – “Bon Iver”
+ Jill Scott – “The Light of the Sun”

And if that isn’t enough music for your ears to absorb, Tyler The Creator aka DJ Stank Daddy has kindly put together a tasty summertime mix of tunes to accompany you over the summer months.

“Hi. I’m On A Big Tour In Europe Right Now, Pretty New To This. I’m Used To Spending Summers Not Doing Anything Productive With My Friends. I’m Really Fucking Home Sick, Not Only That, I Have A Cast On, So, To Feel Better, I Put Together An Hour Mix Of Songs That I Like To Listen To, That Reminds Me Of Summer Back Home. Fuck A Tracklist, Figure It Out. GOLFWANG.” -Tyler.

Download the Summer Camp Mix 2011 HERE

Finally, keep your eyes peeled for the preorder: “Watch The Throne” Kanye West x Jay Z due for release on the 02/08/11.

You can preorder your copy HERE