Yung Lean Stranger / Pitchfork 乐评
粗略翻译
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这位瑞典说唱歌手的第三张专辑让人看到了他的全部潜力，歌曲穿透了曾经掩盖了真实情感的超脱。
当他刚出道的时候，很容易让人对Yung Lean的名字感到愤世嫉俗（Lean有紫水的意思）：这是2010年代初的某种讽刺模式的完美概括，它将空洞的说唱模式重组成了空洞的Tumblr艺术。如果Lean和他的一小群失意的瑞典少年们没有想出 "Sad Boys"，那么不可避免地会有人想出 "Sad Boys"。在我的ТW1tter时间线上，在 "Ginseng Strip 2002 "爆红的时候，我的ТW1tter时间线上充满了同样的表演性的忧郁--对抑郁症的真诚表达，以寻求外在的验证，或者说，有时只是单纯的悲伤，就像#美学。再加上Lean的说唱老生常谈的词语沙拉倾向，让人感觉不可能知道自己是如何认真对待这些东西的。直到后来，我才知道了Lean 这个看似刻薄的名字的真正来历，不是来自于酷酷的网络说唱，而是来自于他的中间名Jonatan Leandoer Håstad。这个细节从某种意义上说是很有趣的，一个人从出生起就注定要成为一个酷酷的网络说唱歌手，而且还有点象征性，这也是一种姿态背后的真实的标志。
围绕Lean的对话往往比音乐更让人感到无奈："看这个瑞典少年如何诠释嘻哈！" 但Lean的早期发行的作品很少与他们的素材有足够的差异化，更不用说他的 "局外人 "身份比起他的风格的原创者更容易引起人们的关注。比起他的 "局外人 "身份，更有趣的是他的具体接触点。当Clams Casino是你的DJ Premier时，你会做什么样的音乐？这个前提，至少看起来很耐人寻味，即使结果通常会让我感到厌倦。
随着Stranger-Lean的第三张正式专辑，也是他最好的一张专辑，似乎很明显，强调Lean作为 "外国说唱解说员 "的做法只会让这个21岁的年轻人感到不爽。"我甚至不知道自己是不是在做hip-hop了，"他在最近的一次采访中承认。Lean的这句话很有意思----如果不是特别独特的说法，一般来说----在当前流行说唱界听起来更像Sad Boys的时候。但从某种意义上说，他是对的。Lean的说唱是他音乐中最不有趣的部分。而在《陌生人》中，他脱离说唱的时刻，是他全部潜力的惊人一瞥，穿透了曾经掩盖了真实情感的疏离感。在这些时刻，Lean的身份从借用的东西转变为与生俱来的东西。
"Ice dropping, red bottom sky/Ice on my feet, I keep slipping, "Ice dropping, red bottom sky/Ice on my feet, I keep slipping, "Lean sing-songs on the chorus of "Red Bottom Sky", his catchiest single to date. 这些都是画家式的歌词--也许有点拐弯抹角，但强烈而又充满世界感，在精神上更接近于魔幻现实主义，而不是他的 "冰封的亚利桑那冰红茶 "阶段的空洞随意性。Lean唱这些歌的方式，尤其让我想起了2000年代中期的瑞典独立流行乐队，如Tough Alliance、CEO和jjj：这些乐队的轻快、巴利阿卝里群岛的声音掩盖了表面下的不安分，他们经常将美国文化的触角融入到他们松散的思想中，有时是令人恼火的，但有时又是超然的。GUD的音乐制作就像缓缓的潮水一样，起伏不定，在空荡荡的空间中创造出回荡的空间；其效果介于加拿大的《Boards of Canada》、jjj的2010年的《Kills》磁带和Chief Keef之间。
后者对Lean的说唱和演唱的影响在这里是很难夸大的（虽然2017年的说唱也是如此），像 "Drop It / Scooter "和 "Push / Lost Weekend "这样的曲目都是成功的，因为它们是Keef的印象。但是，即使Lean的说唱不足，Stranger来自GUD、Yung Sherman和White Armor的惊人制作也让我对这张专辑充满了期待，尽管偶尔也会让我希望有器乐版本（比如 "Iceman，"这首华丽的、渴望的节拍，不会与Boxed或Gobstopper等优雅的器乐格莱姆标签相悖）。然而，Lean的歌曲中充斥着巧妙的Emo和pop-punk的桥段和插曲，让节拍渐渐消逝于虚无。
但Lean把Stranger最有力也是最有希望的歌曲留到了最后，这是一首充满了原始情感和没有任何说唱的歌曲。"Agony "一开始只是Lean在钢琴声中伴奏，他的平淡无奇的意象闪烁着哥特式文学的静谧恐怖，比他的percocoсеt/molly/percoсеt的陈词滥调更让人回味无穷。"我的窗户在恐惧中微笑，"他摇摇晃晃地唱道。"Isolation cАVed in/I adore you, sound of your skin." 而就这最后几句，他在冰岛的儿童合唱团的支持下，在一片令人窒息的沉痛中，静静地诉说着自己的痛苦。最后是 "黄衣人"，据莱恩说，他的灵感来自于1⑧95年罗伯特-钱伯斯的故事集《黄衣国王》--一个围绕着一出戏的超自然恐怖故事，让读过这出戏的人感到疯狂。Lean的乐音吟唱，带着无奈的悲怆，通过Sigur Rós的电影艺术、病态的警笛和致命的行军乐队的嘶吼声，拖着沉重的脚步。Lean，在某一时刻，迷失在声墙中。但这仍然是他职业生涯中最本质的音乐：不再是一个局外人，而是一个充分体现自己的艺术家。
Yung Lean
Stranger
6.8
Meaghan Garvey
RAP
2017年11月11日
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The Swedish rapper’s third album offers glimpses of his full potential, songs that pierce through the detachment that once obscured real emotion.
It was easy, when he first emerged, to feel cynical about Yung Lean off name alone: a perfectly grating encapsulation of a certain early-2010s mode of irony that reconstituted hollowed-out rap tropes into winky Tumblr art. If Lean and his small crew of disillusioned Swedish teenagers hadn’t come up with the Sad Boys, inevitably someone else would hАVe. My ТW1tter timeline, around the time “Ginseng Strip 2002” was blowing up, was filled with the same performative melancholy—sincere articulations of depression primed for external validation, or sometimes simply sadness as #aesthetic. Coupled with Lean’s tendency toward rap cliche word salad, it felt impossible to tell how seriously one was meant to take any of it. It wasn’t until later that I learned the real origin of Lean’s seemingly sardonic name, derived not from cool Internet rap but from his middle name, Jonatan Leandoer Håstad. The detail was funny in a sense—a man destined from birth to be a Cool Internet Rapper—and a bit symbolic too, a sign of something real behind the pose of it all.
The dialogue around Lean often felt more frustrating than the music: “Look how this Swedish teenager interprets hip-hop!” But Lean’s early releases rarely differentiated themselves from their source material enough to reward this curiosity, much LЕSs ouТWeigh the baggage of a white rapper whose “outsider” status draws more attention than those who originated his style. More interesting than his “outsiderness” was his specific point of access: What kind of music do you make when Clams Casino is your DJ Premier? That premise, at least, seemed intriguing, even if the results usually made me feel jaded.
With Stranger—Lean’s third official album, and his best—it seems clear that the emphasis on Lean as “foreign rap interpreter” only did the 21-year old a disservice. “I don’t even know if I’m making hip-hop anymore,” he admitted in a recent interview. It’s an interesting statement in Lean’s case—if not a particularly unique one, generally—at a time when the current popular rap landscape sounds more like the Sad Boys than ever. But he’s right, in a sense: Lean’s rapping is, by a long shot, the least interesting part of his music. And the moments on Stranger where he breaks away from rap are striking glimpses of his full potential, piercing through the detachment that once obscured real emotion. In these moments, Lean’s identity shifts from something borrowed to something innate.
“Ice dropping, red bottom sky/Ice on my feet, I keep slipping,” Lean sing-songs on the chorus of “Red Bottom Sky,” his catchiest single to date. These are painterly lyrics—a bit evasive, maybe, but intense and world-building, closer in spirit to magical realism than the vacant randomness of his “iced-out Arizona Iced Tea” phase. And the way Lean sings them, especially, reminds me of Swedish indie pop of the mid-2000s like the Tough Alliance, CEO, and jj: bands whose blithe, Balearic sounds masked something unsettling beneath the suRFАce, and who often weАVed American cultural touchstones into their loose strands of thought in ways that were sometimes irritatingly ТWee, but sometimes transcendent. GUD’s production moves like a gentle tide, ebbing and flowing to create echoing pockets of empty space; the effect is somewhere beТWeen Boards of Canada, jj’s 2010 Kills tape, and Chief Keef.
The latter’s influence on Lean’s rapped and sung delivery here is hard to overstate (though the same could be said for 2017 rap in general), and tracks like “Drop It / Scooter” and “Push / Lost Weekend” are successful in the sense that they are capable Keef impressions. But even when Lean’s rapping falls short, Stranger’s breathtaking production from GUD, Yung Sherman, and White Armor holds the album together, albeit occasionally making me wish for instrumental versions (as with “Iceman,” a gorgeous, yearning beat that wouldn’t be at odds with elegant instrumental grime labels like Boxed or Gobstopper). NevertheLЕSs, Lean presents well-crafted, transportive songs filled with clever, emo and pop-punk inspired bridges and outros that let the beat fade into nothingness.
But Lean sАVes Stranger’s most powerful, and promising, songs for the end, a one-ТWo punch of raw emotion and no rapping whatsoever. “Agony” begins as little more than Lean accompanied by bleary piano; his plain-spoken imagery flickers with the quiet horror of gothic literature, infinitely more evocative than any of his percoсеt/molly/percoсеt cliches. “My window smiLЕS in fright,” he sings shakily. “Isolation cАVed in/I adore you, sound of your skin.” And for just these last lines, he is backed by an Icelandic children’s choir in a breathtaking swell of quiet anguish. Finally, there is “Yellowman,” inspired according to Lean by the 1⑧95 Robert W. Chambers story collection The King in Yellow—supernatural horror stories that circle around a play that causes madness in those who read it. Lean’s funereal chants drag, with resigned pathos, through Sigur Rós cinematics, sickly sirens, and fatalistic marching band snares. Lean, at some point, gets lost in the wall of sound. And still it feels like the most essential music of his career: no longer an outsider looking in, but an artist fully embodying himself.
