He's back! Ladies and gentlemen, Loyle Carner is back... but he's not how we remember him, and there’s something inherently different to this musical chapter of his. Loyle is back with a vengeance, returning to a grittier hip hop sound: long gone are the days of 'Not Waving But Drowning' and he finally seems to be making music for himself, without care for whose listening.
In 'Georgetown', listeners are quickly plunged into the spoken poetry of Guyanan poet John Agard, who indulges in a tale of multi-racialism and oppression. We are then met with classic Madlib loops and sporadic drums, until Loyle's flow jumps into the beat like a bull out of the gate. The rapper snatches the flame and runs with it, and off the back of his last single ‘Hate’, we can see that Loyle hasn’t just been away from music, he’s been refining his artistry. With Georgetown, there is more passion behind his storytelling - a return to his roots, both musically and culturally.
We are tossed into ricocheting syllabic patterns, as the wordsmith drops words and then picks them up with a swift scoop. Every line lands with resonance, and without a doubt, it's some of the best lyricism we have seen from Loyle. Just like 'Hate', he’s gone for a chorusless, verse-heavy approach to manufacture another heavy-hitting, hip hop-defying ballad. Artists like Loyle Carner make UK hip hop one of the most exciting genres, pushing two fingers to any false concept that ‘hip hop must follow’. Madlib and Carner showed with 'yesterday' just how devastating their link-ups can be, but Georgetown has all the hallmarks of two creative geniuses at their peaks.
Let's not go through a whole single review without mentioning the elephant in the room, that there have been 2 singles in the space of 1 month from the Liverpool fanatic. It's album time baby. Loyle is back, and back for the better.
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