why is Little Simz’ GREY Area on this best 1,000 albums ever thing?
A little real talk before we get into GREY Area. I don’t connect strongly with much of the popular music that’s being produced these days. Which, really, is as it should be.
Without aging myself overly much, you’ll clearly see by way of the music cataloged in this here best 1,000 albums ever project that while there are albums produced way back in the early 1920s all the way through the 2020s, there’s a little more of a bias for roughly the range of the 1980s through the early 2000s.
When it comes to rap music that’s popular these days, I simply don’t connect with much of it, and frankly find some of it mumbly and underproduced, monotone or, worst of all, boring.
Which is why, when I hear current hip-hop that breaks out of that mold and feels original and compelling, I get excited.
Enter GREY Area, a wildly original album from Little Simz, a female* rapper out of England.
*I mention that Simz is female only from the standpoint that hip hop and rap are still genres mostly dominated by men, so it’s even more refreshing to see a female MC doing her thing at this level.
GREY Area also helped solidify the rise of a new generation of UK rap – artists like Skepta, Dave, and Stormzy – proving that the scene could produce music as lyrically sharp and globally relevant as anything coming out of the States.
“Offence” is incredible in a way where you’re like “why isn’t anyone else doing anything even close to this?” Fusing jazz flute, Afrika Bambaataa-like beats, dissonant sound effects, and even cartoon samples(!) – all anchored by a brilliantly original flow delivered with Wu-Tang-level bravado and lyrics that make you listen up.
I’m Jay-Z on a bad day, Shakespeare on my worst days
Never been a punk, trust you can get it in the worst way
“Boss,” which brings in a blues guitar riff as backdrop to Little Simz doing her thing, is another standout, proof she’s unafraid to pull from a wide range of musical influences.
And “Wounds” takes another left turn – a languid collaboration with Chronixx built around strummed guitar, lush production, and a gorgeous chorus that plays perfectly against Simz’s sharp verses.
Pop culture stuff that’s somehow related to Little Simz’ GREY Area
The Netflix reality competition show, Rhythm + Flow, turned me around to an extent. The show takes a serious shot at finding, essentially, America’s Next Hip Hop Superstar, and showcased an impressive array of talent en route during its first season.
Here’s the thing, though: a lot of the show’s segments had its participants rapping in a stripped down, freestyle mode that I found stunning both in terms of the skills it exposed but also because that level of raw, emotive flow connects with me.
As the contestants – which isn’t the best term for these hip hop artists, but that’s technically what they were on Rhythm + Flow – got further into the competition and closer to the finals, they were tasked with ever more elaborate challenges that included crafting new tracks with well-known hip producers and creating original music videos.
In most cases, that’s where the music itself became a lot less interesting to me. Maybe “the sound” of these hip hop tracks fit whatever is currently popular with mainstream hip hop audiences, but I far prefer the raw, stripped-down versions.
For the record, so to speak, while I think that Season 1 winner D Smoke is highly talented and impressive, I was pulling for eventual 6th place finisher Sam Be Yourself. And I was also highly intrigued by Old Man Saxon, among a bunch of others.
Some stats & info about Little Simz – GREY Area
- What kind of musical stylings does this album represent? Rap, Hip Hop, British Rap
- Rolling Stone’s greatest 500 albums ranking – not ranked!
- All Music’s rating – 4.5 out of 5 stars
- When was GREY Area released? 2019
- My ranking, the one you’re reading right now – #901 out of 1,000
Little Simz’ GREY Area on Spotify
A lyrical snippet from Little Simz’ GREY Area that’s evocative of the album in some way, maybe
I said it with my chest and I don’t care who I offend.
What does the “best 1,000 albums ever” mean and why are you doing this?
Yeah, I know it’s audacious, a little crazy (okay, maybe a lot cray cray), bordering on criminal nerdery.
But here’s what it’s NOT: a definitive list of the Greatest Albums of All-Time. This is 100% my own personal super biased, incredibly subjective take on what my top 1,000 albums are, ranked in painstaking order over the course of doing research for nearly a year, Rob from High Fidelity style. Find out more about why I embarked on a best 1,000 albums ever project.