August 24 2017

[Review] Game by $PLIFF [Prod. By LoKey] “offers a huge amount of confidence and style”

The innate simplicity of the beat here makes for a pretty unique soundscape within which the vocalists can express themselves quite freely, and as a listener, you’re inclined to listen to their words rather than get lost in the music surrounding them. The opening vocal part has a huge amount of character and a fairly recognisable vocal tone and performance style, so this is something fans will familiarise themselves with quite quickly. There’s also a sense of drama to the performance in that the flow varies and intensifies depending on the moment, so this helps build a captivating and memorable listening experience. Without a specific musical direction or any instrumentation development, the lyrics perhaps need to be something particularly striking to keep people interesting. This is something that hopefully comes through more and more as you listen to further releases or the longer project from which the track came.

There’s definitely a sense of personality and personal storytelling, it’s always of greater interest when artists talk about the things they know, the things that are unique to them, or the things that haven’t necessarily been said before (or at least haven’t been said in such a way). There’s room for more of this within a track that focuses entirely on rhythm and story telling, however, as mentioned, the performance style shifts things in various different directions and this helps keep the whole thing interesting. As an introductory track it offers a huge amount of confidence and style and individuality, and that’s a great way to reach out and connect with the right kind of audience. There’s always more to be said, and with modern hip-hop or independent hip-hop audiences are often seeking that explicit, unapologetic truth that speaks something refreshing and new to them. Hopefully this draws people in to seek out further music.

By Rebecca Cullen