TOP NEW TRACKS: BAKAR - MILLION MILES

Oh boy, I’m a sucker for UK rappers. I love grime. I love Dizzee Rascal, Stormzy and Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip. It’s a whole classification of hip-hop that makes me wanna kick down a street sign and parkour up to the roof of the building where the Beatles played their final show. But after listening to “million miles” from bakar I’ve learned that while UK hiphop is all well and good, UK hiphop backed by pseudo-new wave funkiness might just be the be-all-end-all— the pinnacle of musical achievements in the 22nd century. This is a sound so unique that outside of this song it doesn’t even exist in any form anywhere else in the universe. That’s pretty friggin rad.

BAKAR - MILLION MILES

Bakar only has a a handful other tunes and none of them sound ANYTHING like this. Is that a good thing? I guess I’m going to leave that up to you. Some are punk-rock indie-soul and others are emotive downtempo electronic chill; he raps on some songs and sings on others. Bakar’s not about to be held down by any of our conventions of genre and I have to stop myself in the hopes that he’s got whole albums full of The English Beat influenced hip-hop songs. This is the only one. Ever. Well, technically not if you count Blondie’s Rapture which I don’t mostly for the case of my argument. Also, who knows what his next single is going to sound like? Maybe he’s working on a whole album of which “million miles” is the lead single.

If this song wasn’t so weird in its genre-bending indifference — slipping between indie, hip-hop and punk rock like it’s nothing — I’d say that bakar was gonna be the next big thing. But it’s possible, likely even, that is just the right kind of weird. The awesome strangeness that super cool weird hip music snobs like me and you and everyone staffed at We Are: The Guard get excited about YEARS before the rest of the world does. Don’t worry, they’ll all catch up inevitably. I’ll just take a couple of years, about the time bakar is nominated for the “Best New Artist” Grammy and we’ll all be laughing like, “Yeah, already know that dummies, late much?” And then he’ll win and he won’t be ours anymore and he’ll make some record with U2 and we’ll be like, “Come on dude, you were so cool once.” But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s just be here now with this excellent tune… the future can wait.

From deep within the murky depths of the Los Angeles River emerged a creature: 50% raver, 50% comedian, 10% Robotcop. Kurt Kroeber doesn’t own a dog, operates Soundbleed (the world’s only dance party comedy talk show rave), and is down to party with you. Come up some time and say “Hey dude!” But definitely make sure to casually drop the secret Illuminati password.