Say Yes To Michigan: A Physical Exploration of Sufjan Stevens' Third Album

One year ago I published my write-up on Sufjan Steven’s Michigan, and in the three years I’ve spent running this blog it’s still the thing I’m most proud of. It took many hours, revisions, and relistens to hone that post to a point where the words accurately captured my affection for the record, and even then my relationship with the album has evolved in the past 12 months.

This fall I accepted a job in Detroit and moved out to the Great Lake State from my hometown of Portland, Oregon. While there are plenty of reasons why taking that job was an objectively-good career move, I’d be lying if I said my love for this record didn’t influence my decision in some way. 

So back in September I packed my belongings into my car and spent five days driving across the country to a state I’d never been to, where I knew nobody, and knew almost nothing about.

On my way across the state line, I stopped at the welcome center, took photos, and (of course) queued up Sufjan’s Michigan on my phone. I also made sure to keep my physical copy of the record handy for any photo opportunities that may present themselves, and I quickly realized that there would be many. 

Using a state map from the visitor center, I sat down with Genius, Google Maps, and my copy of the record to plot out how many different locations Sufjan names throughout the course of the record’s 66-minute running time. Turns out it’s a lot.

What the process looked liked.

While it’s far from comprehensive, I’ve gone out of my way to visit the sights, sounds, and feelings captured on Sufjan’s third record. I’m not going to pretend this is anything more than a glorified iPhone-quality photo gallery, but I view it as an amendment to last year’s Michigan write-up. It’s a physical manifestation of my love for the record and how much it has impacted my life both spiritually and literally. 

This post is a documentation of my life and how Michigan continues to intertwine with it every step of the way. 

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Flint (For the Unemployed and Underpaid)

City of Flint Water Plant

City of Flint Water Plant

For the Widows in Paradise, for the Fatherless in Ypsilanti

Ypsilanti City Hall

Say Yes! to M!ch!gan!

Bagley Pedestrian Bridge

Holland

Holland

Big Red Lighthouse

Detroit, Lift Up Your Weary Head! (Rebuild! Restore! Reconsider!)

The Spirit of Detroit

Romulus

Romulus Historical Museum

Sleeping Bear, Sault Saint Marie

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore

They Also Mourn Who Do Not Wear Black (For the Homeless in Muskegon)

Muskegon State Park

Redford (For Yia-Yia & Pappou)

The Redford Theater

The Marquee of Redford Township

Yours Truly Enjoying Sleeping Bear, running to the top, and only getting a little scared

Submitted Music Showcase Volume 1

2018 has been a year of many firsts for this blog. One of the most significant changes was a full redesign as we escaped from the clutches of Tumblr and moved onto our own dedicated site. While it was a long time in the making (and comes with its own challenges), this move has allowed us much more flexibility as far as what we can do and how we can present ourselves. 

One important addition within that redesign was a contact page including an email dedicated solely to Swim Into The Sound. I initially just set this email up for solidarity and didn’t expect to get much use out of it, but I’ve been surprised, overwhelmed, and overjoyed by the number of music submissions I’ve received through it. 

Busy as ever, I’ve let these submissions build up over the past few months as I tried to figure out how they fit into the site and my schedule. Hopefully a semi-recurring feature, I wanted to create a place to write explicitly about all this awesome music that is being sent directly to me. It’s already cool to know people are reading, but to get actual music sent my way is a different form of affirmation entirely. While I can’t write about everything, I wanted to say thank you to every band, artist, and creative that’s sent their work my way. Some of these have been in my inbox since the summer, so sorry that this took so long, but I wanted to make sure I gave your art the justice it deserves. Without further adieu, I’m thrilled to present Swim Into The Sound’s first-ever Submitted Music Showcase.  

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Nanaki - Decline & Dislocation

Simultaneously prolific and moving at his own pace, Nanaki is a post-rock project helmed by Michael Daugherty who’s creating spiritual post-rock songs that drip with distortion and head-bobbing riffs. Decline & Dislocation is actually Nanaki’s second release of the year after January’s Epilogue. Recorded in tandem, the two releases are independent pieces that also function together as part of a larger journey. Opening track “Curator of Molluscs” sets the tone nicely, beginning with a slow-burn instrumental that builds into a propulsive riff worthy of a Mogwai record. The remainder of the album hits just as hard, and late album cut “Despicable Fuckwits Elect Complete Prick” is a strong contender for song title of the year.

Wet Dream - “Groove Plug”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYVLsD1m1jc

If you needed more heart-rending electronic indie rock in your life, Portland-based Wet Dream is here to supply it. Filmed in a geodesic dome filled with mirrors, the video for “Groove Plug” is a vibrant, dreamy, and hypnotic experience that pairs with the music perfectly. Sporting a smooth bass line, fan-like keyboard work, and an absolutely immaculate chorus, “Groove Plug” is a psychedelic love song of duality, replication, and universality.

William Patrick Owen - first person singular

Since the days of Bob Dylan, it’s only become easier to get your thoughts and feelings out into the world. While there were plenty of folk artists before him, Dylan represented a sort of stripped-back rough-around-the-edges purity that anyone could achieve. One man, one guitar, and his poetry. That’s it. It’s barebones, but it allows the words, emotion, and heart to take center stage, and that’s exactly what’s happening on William Patrick Owen’s first person singular. Fittingly sung from first-person, the album is a melancholy, earnest, and queer exploration of the self, sung to nobody in particular. first person singular has all the makings of a fantastic folk album. Evocative of cold fall evenings, crunchy leaves, and sorrowful goodbyes, the record is 52 minutes of nostalgic regret that can only be voiced to song, lest they be too powerful on its own. 

Polartropica - “Golden Soul”

Some topics are too raw to handle on their own. Death. Grief. Suffering. Loss. Music is important because, not only does it give us a way to cope with those concepts as a listener, it also gives artists the same opportunity. While there’s something to be said about how performing that kind of emotional exorcism night after night impacts an artist, but the form itself will always be there to act as an outlet. On “Golden Soul,” Los Angeles-based pop/psych artist Polartropica is addressing this sort of pained experience writing about a friend who went missing after becoming addicted to opioids prescribed by a doctor. Within recent years we’ve seen multiple artists speak on this topic from The Wonder Years to Kanye West, it’s an issue that’s (sadly) recurring within our society. “Golden Soul” recounts lead singer Ihui Cherise Wu’s experience losing her friend to the slow, disintegrating, and hopeless phenomenon addiction that encroaches until it swallows someone’s life. It’s a touching song with an instrumental that melds an unexpected mix of pop, synths, and string arrangements creating what she describes as a “bubblegum psychedelia” sound. A vital message packaged in a unique song that tells an all-too-familiar story. 

Tyson Kelly - “Girl You’re So Money”

Have you ever heard a song that sounded so familiar you’re sure you’ve heard it somewhere before? Something that feels as if it was beamed in from a past life. A sound that makes you unsure how music has progressed this far without this exact melody being created? That’s how I feel about Tyson Kelly’s “Girl You’re So Money.” Like a long-lost Beatles single, the song is a psychedelic love ballad with groovy guitar, smooth bass, and an absolutely infectious chorus. 

Los Doggies - Heddagabalus

Sometimes tastes are simple. Sometimes you don’t need a high-minded concept, or multi-genre mastery, you just need a really great tone. Los Doggies’ Heddagabalus is a tripped-out, grungy psych album that drips with incredible guitar tone and laid-back melodies. Sometimes you don’t need anything else. 

Weston Smith - “Beckon”

Inspired by Japanese Soul artist Hiroshi Sato, Weston Smith’s “Beckon” comes to us from DC in a skull-adorned psych pop package. Featuring a laid-back synthy instrumental, “Beckon” feels like equal parts Mac Demarco and Ween. A little weird. A little loving. A lot of emotion. 

Norphlet - Norphlet

Walking an intoxicating line between emo, pop-punk, and indie rock, Norphlet’s self-titled EP hits you right in that space teetering between melancholy and unbridled joy. Packing an emotional punch, the EP’s first track “Brand New” bowls the listener over with a fakeout acoustic start, before erupting into a raucous pop-punk beat.

Emmanuel Patterson - The Silver Story, A Starry Night

Sometimes music is best enjoyed on its own. No visuals and no distractions, just you, sound, and the void of space. That’s exactly how Emmanuel Patterson recommends his music be listened, and I couldn’t agree more. While I gave the record a spin air-condition-less in the heat of summer, the album chilled me to the bone and left me in a completely different emotional state than I was going into it. Featuring gentle singing, warm lyricism, and loving instrumentation, The Silver Story, A Starry Night is a Wintery folk album. With well-considered ornamental additions, regretful lyricism, and thought-provoking ambient stretches, the album is meant to be enjoyed in isolation. While the cover is reminiscent of American Football, the snow-covered music almost evokes Michigan-era Sufjan at some points. 

New Ghost - Burning Out EP

While they sound (and look) like a black metal band, New Ghost’s music is proof that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. Released over the summer, the Group’s two-track Burning Out EP subverts expectations from its first notes, bowling the listener over with a cascading wave of electronic claps and warbles. Soon joined by the ghastly vocals of Caroline Cawley, the track plays out like a post-modern, futuristic dreamscape where technology has consumed everything and our narrator is the sole remnant of a long-forgotten world. Just as impressive, “Sleepwalkers 1 & 2” is an 8-minute instrumental expedition that winds its way to a conclusion fit for a feature-length movie.

A Very Sufjan Christmas

The following is a welcome post from our sister site A Very Sufjan Christmas. Follow us at @SufjanChristmas on Twitter or @SufjanChristmas on Instagram to enjoy daily song write-ups this December!

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The holidays are our greatest gift. Regardless of surface-level differences in how we celebrate this time of year, the one thing we all share is tradition. It doesn’t matter if you observe Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, or nothing at all, every one of us have rituals we use to get us through the winter. It’s the coldest, darkest, most inhospitable time of the year, and that’s easier to get through when we’re closer to other people, both physically and psychologically. Tradition is survival. Tradition is human.

That is the true meaning of Christmas. 

Not presents.
Or Santa Claus.
Or even Jesus.

Christmas represents universal tradition. A communal coping mechanism evolved on a species-wide level for the purpose of survival on both a physical and spiritual level. Over time, Christmas has been twisted to mean hundreds of different things. The truth is Christmas is what you make of it, and that’s what makes it the greatest holiday in the world. 

While Christmas has endured in the pop-cultural landscape for far less time than the holiday itself, it has still been around long enough for millions of different traditions to develop. From Coca-Cola popularizing Santa Claus to Montgomery Ward’s creation of Rudolph, there are a seemingly infinite number of touchstones that we share as a culture. Movies, TV, music, food, smells, shapes, and symbols all seep into our head from a young age, giving us a complicated, tangled web of connections and bonds to this complicated and tangled time of year. 

Oppositely, there are just as many individual traditions that we carry out on a much smaller scale. Whether it’s watching A Christmas Story with your family or making the same cookies every year with your roommates, there are both universal celebrations and personal ones. Among this delicate balancing act of traditions, vacations, gifts, and rushing around it’s important to slow down and have a personal escape during this hyper-communal time of year. For many people, one of the newest additions to this Personal Christmas Canon is Sufjan Stevens’ holiday music. 

While you may recognize him from his contributions to 2017’s Call Me By Your Name, Sufjan has been creating soul-affirming and critically-acclaimed folk music for nearly two decades. Aside from landmark artistic creations like Illinois, Age of Adz, and Carrie & Lowell, Sufjan has also displayed his personal devotion to the holidays with a catalog of two multi-hour Christmas compilations. 

Religion, Christianity, and family have been a constant throughline of Sufjan’s discography, so the Christmas holiday proved to be both a fascination for Sufjan as well as a synthesis of all these themes. Releasing one EP a year from 2001 to 2011, Sufjan has birthed to exactly 100 Christmas songs over the course of one decade. Some original, some covers, some standards, each entry is lovingly-crafted and amounts to more than 4.5 hours of Christmas spirit. These songs are collected on Songs For Christmas and Silver and Gold, two releases that have warmed the hearts of indie fans and Christmas lovers alike. 

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A Very Sufjan Christmas is a blog dedicated to every one of these songs. Much like we all celebrate the holiday season in our special way, every listener has a unique connection with Sufjan’s extensive body of Christmas-based work. As such, each post on this website will tackle one specific Sufjan Christmas song from a different writer’s perspective as we countdown the days till Christmas. Maybe they’ll talk about their experience with Sufjan, or their memories attached to that one song. Maybe they’ll just write about the music itself. 

These songs are a window into the traditions and lives of the writer. There are few albums that have opened this many spiritual doors for this many people, and that’s why these songs must be celebrated. These are the soundtracks to Christmases past and the inner lives of music fans the world over.

You’ll quickly find that each song is a beautiful work worthy of its own celebration. Whether this is your first experience with Sufjan, or you are a long-time fan, we hope you find as much connection, warmth, and joy in these songs as we did when we first heard them. We hope you connect with these stories and that they allow you to reflect on your own traditions and those of your family. Most of all, we hope you enjoy the music and we wish you a very Sufjan Christmas this year. 

Welcome to our Winter Wonderland. 

Love, Kyle, Taylor, and the rest of the A Very Sufjan Christmas Staff.

October 2018: Album Review Roundup

Now that we’re most of the way through 2018 I feel like it’s safe to say that this has been an incredible year for music. Maybe I’m just paying more attention than usual through these monthly roundups, but lately I’ve felt absolutely overwhelmed with a wealth of music, both new and old. It’s always easy to be hyperbolic and say “this year has been the best” while you’re in the middle of it, but October certainly made a strong case for itself. 

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TTNG - Animals Acoustic

Few bands ever find themselves in the privileged position to celebrate the tenth anniversary of anything. Even fewer bands can boast the unique distinction of having crafted one of their genre's most defining works for an entire generation of fans. When TTNG released Animals back in 2008, the band themselves probably didn’t even know what they had put out into the world. One decade down the line TTNG is celebrating with a fully-acoustic re-recording of their seminal math rock LP, and the songs sound just as fresh as the day they were recorded. Whether it’s the careening vocals of “Gibbon,” the heart-rending piano of “Crocodile,” or the jagged string section on “Badger,” every song is breathtaking. On Animals Acoustic TTNG was able to retain the original album’s brilliance while simultaneously adding just enough flourishes to make this release feels like a genuine celebration. Here’s to Animals and everything it stands for. 

St. Vincent - MassEducation

Feels like there’s no better time to admit it, but St. Vincent’s MASSEDUCTION was just barely edged off our best of 2017 list. In fact, I spent days agonizing over its 21st placement, almost going as far as turning the list into a top 25 just so I could give myself the opportunity to write about it. Needless to say, when I heard that St. Vincent was revisiting one of my favorite albums from last year in a stripped-down/reworked style I was ecstatic. While the new versions of the songs work excellently on their own, one of the more impressive aspects of MassEducation is its sequencing. Re-ordered from top to bottom, the tracklist now flows in a completely different way, delivering the same core message but somehow telling a more impactful story in the process. A beautiful companion piece to one of last year’s most impressive musical statements.

Kurt Vile - Bottle It In

If you were to look up the phrase “stone cold chiller” in the dictionary, you’d find a picture of Kurt Vile. While he initially made a name for himself contributing guitar to heartland rockers The War On Drugs, he quickly broke out through fantastic solo work and (more recently) sunny indie rock collaborations. Centered around his melting guitarwork and even-keeled vocal delivery, Bottle It In is picture-perfect Vile. From enthusiastic hoots and hollers on “Check Baby” to a smoldering solo on “Skinny Mini,” there are countless peaks on the record, but even the baseline is an ever-enjoyable laid-back slacker rock. The perfect soundtrack to a crisp fall morning or a day spent in a hammock drinking beers and taking advantage of the last warm days of summer. 

Haley Heynderickx & Max García Conover - Among Horses III

After releasing her emotionally-devastating debut earlier this year, Haley Heynderickx has been on a whirlwind of tours, press coverage, rave reviews, Tiny Desk performances, and more. Capping off her eventful 2018, the Portland, Oregon native now also gets to add “collaborative project” to that list. Teaming up with Portland, Maine-based songwriter Max García Conover, the two created Among Horses III; a six-song, seventeen-minute mindful jaunt of folky goodness. Whether weaving thoughtful narrative webs or showing off their acoustic chops, Among Horses is an aggressively-pleasant and wondrous release that leaves you wanting more. A perfect encapsulation of pensive fall weather and homesick love. 

Destroy Boys - Make Room

Destroy Boys rock. I could stop the review there, but there’s simply too much to gush about on Make Room. Ever since Spotify served me up the careening “American River” over the summer, I’ve been bumping the group on a regular basis in anticipation of this album. Featuring thrashing guitars, snarling vocals, and thunderous drums, the group’s sophomore record is picture-perfect 90’s garage rock. The band manages to capture the grungy essence of groups like Toadies, Bikini Kill, and Green Day while also putting their own spin on things for a release that feels more like a long-awaited announcement than an undiscovered punk force. Lovely, powerful, and crushing music that will leave you emotionally and physically decimated. 

Gunna and Lil Baby - Drip Harder

I love me some good trap, but it’s never a genre that I go to for artistic fulfillment. While both Gunna and Lil Baby have had a banner year of hits, viral moments, and career-elevating collabs, they rarely ever produce music that’s worth hanging your hat on. On Drip Harder the two up-and-coming rappers team up for 38-minutes of banging beats and boastful bars. While the final result won’t wind up on any end of the year lists, it’s absolutely perfect for those moments when all you need is some hyped-up background trap.

This Will Destroy You - New Others Part Two

While I feel like I just got done digesting the post-rock forebearer’s previous release, This Will Destroy You have already outdone themselves not 18 days later with a surprise follow-up to last month’s New Others Part One. While ‘Part One’ should have been a dead giveaway, the sequel’s unceremonious Tuesday release took me by complete surprise. Capping off an already-eventful year, New Others Part Two seals off the group’s 2018 into a duology of thrilling instrumental rock that’s steeped in urgency and immediacy. From ripping opener “Sound of Your Death” to slow-mounting closer “Provoke,” Part Two finds the band unfurling in exciting new directions that are both spiritually and artistically satisfying. 

The Wonder Years, Shortly, Oso Oso, and Have Mercy - Tour Split

When I first saw the announcement for this split on Instagram, I had to stand up and physically leave the room out of excitement. Featuring my favorite band of all-time, and two of my standout discoveries from this year (Shortly and Oso Oso), Tour Split finds the fall tourmates covering each other's songs in an affectionate familial style. While I already raved about Shortly’s new EP last month, hearing The Wonder Years cover one of her songs in their heartfelt style is both jaw-dropping and incredibly affirming as a fan of both parties. 

Minus the Bear - Fair Enough

While I saw them earlier this year on their victory lap of a tenth-anniversary tour, Minus The Bear’s breakup announcement this summer blindsided me and sent waves of shocked texts through my friend groups. I understand not wanting to endlessly play the same songs you wrote when you were a teen, but Minus The Bear was a band I just assumed would “always be there.” 

“Seventeen years goes by in a flash” lead singer Jake Snider admitted on-stage during an October performance of the band’s Farewell Tour. As he said this, my mind flashed to all the ways Minus The Bear has touched my life. They were my gateway to entire genres. They gave me and one of oldest friends something to bond over. They created my favorite song of all time. Minus The Bear’s music has soundtracked some of my most formative years, phases, and feelings of my life, and that makes the group’s final release all the more bittersweet to write about.

Now that I’ve had time to properly process their end (and that phase of my life along with it) I found myself emotionally-ready to enjoy the band’s newest release, and as much as I wish there were more, it’s fantastic. Featuring three new tracks and a remix to one of their biggest late-career hits, Fair Enough is a four-song send-off to nearly two decades of beauty. A wonderful punctuation mark on an entire musical lifetime. 

Quick Hits

• Kim Petras - Turn off The Light, Vol. 1: The pop princess serves up eight fresh bops on her first full release.

• Titus Andronicus - Home Alone on Halloween: A seasonal EP featuring two new songs alongside a spooky rerecording of a track from A Productive Cough. 

• Kero Kero Bonito - Time ‘n’ Place: The music that Knives Chau would have made if she were in a band. 

• Phoebe Bridgers - Stranger In the Alps (Deluxe Edition): One year after her emotionally-shattering, list-topping debut, Phoebe Bridgers gifts us a deluxe edition that adds a heart-rending Tom Petty cover and a spellbinding stripped-down demo. 

• Clarence Clarity - THINK: PIECE: Part funk, part electronic, part hip-hop, part rnb, Clarence Clarity’s newest LP is a bombastic and eclectic assault on the senses that must be heard to be believed.

• Adrianne Lenker - abysskiss: Ten lower-case folk songs that showcase an isolated soul trapped in amber and held up into the light.

• High On Fire - Electric Messiah: Ass-ripping, face-melting metal that’s more thrashy and anthemic than I was expecting. Like a spiritually-updated Iron Maiden. 

• mewithoutyou - Untitled: The follow-up to August’s equally-unnamed EP is far more lively, a little more pissed off, and a pinch more punk.

• Jim James - Uniform Clarity: The acoustic re-recording of Uniform Distortion that, when combined, showcases the exact range that Jim James and My Morning Jacket thrive within. 

• Sheck Wes - MUDBOY: Yet another viral success story, Sheck segued two mega-hits and a “SICKO MODE” name-drop into a forceful and explosive hip-hop release that can barely contain itself.

• T.I. - DIME TRAP: While he may not receive the credit he deserves when it comes to the creation of the trap genre, Dime Trap is picture-perfect proof why T.I. has endured and influenced for this long. 

• Atmosphere- Mi Vida Local: With impeccable beats and effortless flows, Slug and Ant dish out 48-minutes of hip-hop that comes pre-rolled and ready to smoke.

• Fucked Up - Dose Your Dreams: Relentless and pounding punk music featuring gnarled vocals and dancy beats. A soul-affirming odyssey on-par with Titus Andronicus. 

• Ron Gallo - Stardust Birthday Party: Self-conscious post-punk with a laid-back flavor.

• WNYC Studios - 27: The Most Perfect Album: In an effort to educate voters (and themselves) in the lead-up to Election 2018, More Perfect created a free compilation about all 27 amendments. 

• Black Peaks - All That Divides: A bold step forward into a soulful and swirling new direction for metalcore.

• Kikagaku Moyo - Masana Temples: Jazzy and light psychedelic music that lifts you up and pushes you forward. 

• Quavo - QUAVO HUNCHO: The figurehead of the Atlanta trap trio steps out into his own 19-track outing of hard-hitting bangers, emotional auto-tune, and decadent flexes.

• Yowler - Black Dog in My Path: A dark and rainy-day counterpart to yesterday’s unbridled optimism. 

• Basement - Beside Myself: Tasteless and formulaic indie pop-punk.

• Future & Juice WRLD - WRLDONDRUGS: After putting himself on the map with one of 2018’s most unexpected hits Juice WRLD teamed up with Future for a quickly-turned-around collab of drug use and emotional abuse. 

• Greta Van Fleet - Anthem Of The Peaceful Army: It’s not that bad. 

• Lil Yachty - Nuthin’ 2 Prove: After kinda reaching my tipping point with Lil Boat 2, Yachty returns with a half-step in the right direction and a focus on bangers over everything.

• Empress Of - Us: Bilingual indie music with pop production and endlessly-accessible delivery.

• Open Mike Eagle - What Happens When I Try To Relax: Hyper-aware hip-hop that inhales pop-culture and lobs it back at you before you can even react.

• Cloud Nothings - Last Building Burning: Hard-charging punk music that springs back and forth from spiraling darkness to boundless optimism. 

• Trent Reznor & Atticus Rose - Mid90s (Original Soundtrack): Short but sweet, Trent Reznor and Atticus Rose team up yet again to provide sparkles of pensive, instrumental moments in between the time-appropriate hip-hop of Jonah Hill’s directorial debut. 

• Will Oldham - Songs of Love and Horror: Music for the spiritually-exhausted.

• Ashland - misc: Rise Record’s newest signees release a three-song teaser of their hard-hitting anthemic balladry. 

• R.E.M. - Live at the BBC: A decade-spanning five-disc collection of the band’s BBC performances, all of which amount to 7.5-hours of classic alternative radio hits. 

• John Carpenter, Cody Carpenter, Daniel Davies - Halloween (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack): Just in time for the holiday itself John Carpenter and Daniel Davies team up yet again alongside Carpenter’s son for a fast-paced piano-laden return to one of Horror’s most iconic scores.

• Khalid - Suncity: After managing to become a global pop star overnight with his debut record, the American Teen is back with a mini-album of fresh songs to keep the die-hard fans satisfied. 

• MØ - Forever Neverland: One of pop music’s best-kept secrets finally gives fans her long-awaited sophomore album, and it’s a colorful and perfectly-produced work of art. 

• Weakened Friends - Common Blah: Weakened Friends offer up slightly-punky throwback garage rock tunes that transport you back in time two decades with minimal effort. 

• Petal - Live at Studio 4: The Run For Cover indie rocker continues to shake my emotional state with a three-pack of live songs from this year’s Magic Gone. 

• Advance Base - Live on Audiotree: A relaxed stroll through the singer/songwriter’s most impactful songs to date. 

• Thom Yorke - Suspiria Soundtrack: The Radiohead frontman scores a (mostly) instrumental horror movie for a distorting out-of-body 80-minutes.

• Antarctigo Vespucci - Love in the Time of E-Mail: Jeff Rosenstock and Chris Farren team up for one of indie music’s most vivacious supergroups of the year.

• Unknown Mortal Orchestra - IC-01 Hanoi: A collection of wonderfully-weird instrumental tracks that provide a counterpoint to this year’s satiating Sex & Food.

• MadeinTYO - Sincerely, Tokyo: Lively and youthful bangers with more ad-libs than any man can handle. 

• Julia Holter's - Aviary: 90-minutes of spaced-out feelings and drip-fed emotions.

• William Shatner - Shatner Claus - The Christmas Album: The man recorded “Jingle Bells” with Henry Rollins, and if that doesn’t excite you, then I don’t know what will.

• John Legend - Legendary Christmas: It’s “Adult Contempo” as hell, but Legend definitely gets points for original songs. 

• Daughters - You Won't Get What You Want: Noisy and industrial rock that soundtracks the mass-destruction of society. 

• The Berries - Start All Over Again: Jangle-heavy tunes that rumble with a spiritual ferocity.

• Stand Atlantic - Skinny Dipping: Bouncy female-fronted pop-punk that’s as catchy as it is relatable. 

• Ty Segall - Fudge Sandwich: His third release of the year, Furdge Sandwich sees the prolific multi-instrumantalist covering everyone from John Lennon to Amon Düül II in an extremely-brown style. 

• Robyn - Honey: Robyn returns for her first release in eight years, offering up a cleanly-produced slate of nine immaculate electropop songs. 

• Mick Jenkins - Pieces of a Man: Humanizing hip-hop.

• The Browning - Geist: The Missouri-born metal act add some much-needed poppy and electronic metalcore to the genre’s landscape.

• Arlington - A Walk Through Jackson County: One of Rise Records’ most perplexing signees dole out a catchy batch of country-flavored alternative rock.

• Laura Gibson - Goners: Warmed by coffee and filled with winter air, the Oregon-born folk artist crafts ten rural love songs.

• Blocboy JB - Don’t Think That: The greatest Memphis glow-up of the year heats up the winter with an EP full of ignorant bangers.

• Curren$y, Freddie Gibbs, and The Alchemist - Fetti: A spiritual successor to their GTA contribution continuing the collab for another jazzy and free-flowing 23-minutes.

Plus new singles from Charli XCX, Pusha T, Anderson .Paak, Pond, Lil Pump, Courtney Barnett, Kurt Vile, Soccer Mommy, Pond, Hovvdy, Regrettes, Flight of the Conchords, Girlpool, Weezer, FIDLAR, Kodak Black, Billie Eilish, Post Malone, Toro y Moi, Denzel Curry, Protomartyr, Lil Peep, Powers Pleasant, Saves The Day, Vulfpeck, Citizen, Cardi B, Bring Me The Horizon, Takeoff, Tyler, The Creator, Tides of Man, Fleet Foxes, Varsity, Deerhunter, Thundercat, Flatbush Zombies, Beach House, Young Fathers, Slipknot, and Pedro The Lion.

Does Offset Own A Patek Philippe? – A Journalistic Investigation

It starts off innocently enough: a reference here, a metaphor there, maybe even an allusion or a  simile if things get really extreme. But what happens when an artist becomes so infatuated with consumerism that an individual purchase becomes a recurring theme in their work? We’re about to find out. 

Formed in 2008, most readers will probably be surprised to learn that Atlanta-based trap superstars Migos have been around for over a decade. Comprised of rappers Quavo, Takeoff, and Offset, the group has been releasing a steady stream of mixtapes and albums ever since 2011. While the trio quickly made a name for themselves among hardcore hip-hop heads, they only recently achieved mainstream success thanks to the astronomical popularity of songs like “Bad and Boujee” and “Walk It Talk It.”

Chart-topping songs aside, the group has also proven their strength as a force in pop culture, often credited with popularizing the now-ubiquitous “triplet flow” as well as the (quickly-ruined) dab. While the group’s songs often revolve around the award-winning formula of money, women, jewelry, and drugs, they occasionally do venture into deeper waters... but that’s not what this post is about. 

Following 2017’s immensely-popular Culture, the group dropped a long-awaited sequel earlier this year and after multiple listens an interesting through-line emerged: Offset can’t stop rapping about his Patek Philippe. 

While rap as a whole drops name brands more than any other genre, this level of specificity is unheard of, especially at this frequency. As a bit of a spiritual sequel to 21 Savage’s obsession with food, I’m proud to present: Does Offset Own A Patek Philippe? - A Journalistic Investigation.

We Are The 17%

According to lyrics.com (which is far from comprehensive) there are precisely 180 songs that contain the word “Patek” as of October 2018. At a grand total of 31 references, this means that Offset has cornered roughly 17% of the total Patek-referencing market.

Due to the sheer abundance of Patek name-drops, I’m choosing to focus solely on those contained within the group’s most recent release. For the sake of completeness, I’m going to cite all of Offset’s other Patek references at the end of this article, but for now, let’s jump straight into the madness that is Culture II’s Patek-based hellscape.

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“Narcos”

Culture II’s first Patek Philipe name-drop comes in at track number three. Featuring some of the album’s more visceral Patek language, Offset embraces the slang “water” (an abstraction of ice) to describe his bejeweled timepiece. Through this potent bout of descriptors, Offset explains that his watch is so expensive it’s practically overflowing with excessive adornments. 

“Auto Pilot”

It seems that if Offset happens to own a Patek, it may bear a two-tone design. To fully flesh out this pied timekeeping flex, he draws a direct comparison between the multiple colors of his watch to the multiple colors of women who are throwing themselves at his feet. 

“Emoji A Chain”

Much like Ororo Munroe, Offset possesses the ability to change the weather by merely strapping his trusty Patek to his wrist. While (presumably) not literal, this line once again draws back to the water-based well for an elemental flex of wealth and opulence.

“Stir Fry”

In one of Culture II’s more illusory lines, Offset utilizes mucus-adjacent slang to illustrate how fancy and tricked-out his Patek is. Either that, or he has run out of Kleenex and we’re meant to read these words at face value. 

“White Sand”

In this star-studded mid-album cut, Offset comes in hot with a straightforward boast in which he explicitly states the amount he paid for his Patek Philippe. It seems we have confirmation, folks. 

“Beast”

In a moment of gender equality, Offset throws the listener for a loop as he explains how someone else’s Patek made him feel. Perhaps the inciting incident for his own purchase, this lyric offers a glimpse into the rapper’s consumer-friendly mindset while simultaneously acting as a subliminal criticism of capitalism and the dangers of following the crowd.

“Motorsport”

Venturing back once more to the “water” slang, Offset elaborates that not only is his Patek adorned with jewels, but his Audemars Piguet as well. Hopefully they’re waterproof, because at this point he’s practically submerged!

“Top Down On Da Nawf”

In Offset’s final Patek namedrop on Culture II, he takes a slightly more pensive approach to the jewelry flex, using it to contrast his current level of wealth with his previous life of crime. This confessional exposition illustrates Offset’s desire, nay, need for luxury. A stark contrast indeed.

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In Summary

There you have it. All of Offset’s Patek references contained on Culture II. In addition to these eight references from Migos’ latest album, there are an additional twenty-three references below that come from Offset’s features, collaborations, and other Migos releases. Given the scope, size, and sheer number of Patek references, I think it’s safe to say that Offset owns at least one Patek Philippe.

You can thank me for my service in the comments.

In all seriousness, much like Lil Pump and his grandma, I think this is just a case of a rapper revisiting the same topic because they don’t have a lot to say… and that’s perfectly fine. The Migos have produced music for an entire decade, so it’s not surprising any one of them has said the same thing more than a few times. Additionally, nobody goes to Migos for deep cerebral bars. As long as their songs have a dope beat and clean flow, the lyrics are essentially the least important aspects of their music. 

If anything, this exploration proves that the closer you listen to the words, the more you start to realize how unimportant they really are. What’s impressive is how little this lack of lyrical depth actually detracts from my enjoyment of the music. God knows that discovering this specific quirk has only made me like Offset more if only because I’m now listening for Patek name-drops in every song and feature. Here’s to another decade of explosive success and many more Patek purchases. 

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Comprehensive Philippe

1. “Balenciaga Challenge” - 6LACK

• Got a bust down Patek, a plain bitch (Patek)

2. “Bosses Don't Speak” - Migos

• Hop in the frog and leap (leap) / Patek Philippe (Patek Philippe)

3. “Call Casting” - Migos

• Spent you a hundred, Philippe on your wrist (Patek)

4. “Darth Vader” - Metro Boomin, 21 Savage, Offset

• I bought the plain Philippe, they said I was being too extra (plain)

5. “Drip” - Cardi B

• Patek on my wrist, and it's glistenin' (drip, drip)

6. “Do Not Disturb” - Smokepurpp & Murda Beatz

• For the Patek, I Rollie the watch (for the Patek)

7. “Fucking Up Profits” - Migos

• Rollie, the AP, the plain Philipe (plain)

8. “Ghostface Killers” - Metro Boomin, 21 Savage, Offset

• Thot and addy (thot), love the Patek on my arm (Patek)

9. “Hook Up” - Lil Baby, Offset

• Pateks on fleek, got baguettes in my neck (hey)

10. “Iced Out My Arms” - Dj Khaled

• This is a hundred Patek, 20 more for Piguet

11. “Interlude” - Lil Yachty & Offset

• I show my Patek so much, say I'm petty (petty)

12. “Lost it” - Rich The Kid

• 44 millimeter iced out Philippe (ice)

13. “Major Bag Alert” - DJ Khaled

• Patek Philippe with the snow in the wind (Patek) (Oh)

14. “No Drama” - Tinashe

• Got Patek on her wrist, in her panties (Patek, hey)

15. “Peek a Boo” - Lil Yachty

• Look at my Patek, I'm flexin', I'm petty (I'm petty)

16. “Rap Saved Me”

• His and her Pateks (his and hers)

17. “Ric Flair Drip” - Metro Boomin, 21 Savage, Offset

• Bought my first Patek, it got some rain on it (Patek)

18. “Slippery” - Migos

• I gave her her first Philippe (Philippe)

19. “Still Serving” - Metro Boomin, 21 Savage, Offset

• Rich bitch, and yeah my bitch got a Patek

20. “Taste” Tyga

• And she got the Patek on water moccasin (water moccasin)

21. “Violation Freestyle” - Offset

• Bust down my wrist, bitch I'm Patek'd up (bust up)

22. “Wrist Thunderstorm” - Offset

• Patek, the diamonds do backflips (woo)

23. “ZEZE” - Kodak Black

• She an addict (Addict), addict for the lifestyle and the Patek (Patek)