Album Review: Childish Gambino, because the internet

Childish Gambino, aka Donald Glover (you know, that guy from Community) is an actor, writer, comedian, singer, rapper and producer from California. Because the internet is Gambino's second studio album, his first being Camp. It was released in the December of 2013 and yes, I know, all of my reviews are long overdue...

Gambino actually wrote a screenplay to accompany this album, which I think is quite a clever way to add more dimensions to his music. This album is very story driven, which means that each song of the album effortlessly flows into the next. This is done by repeated samples and a progressive story. I love how he chose to centre around a theme for this album, that is technology and how how it effects social interactions between people. He makes many references to technology in his lyrics such as "hashtag", "retweet" and "trolling". Similarly, an interpretation of the song 'II. Worldstar' is that it's depicting the internet as a sadistic place with attention seeking users, doing anything to gain "likes" or "hits". I think the fact that Gambino is actually writing about the topic of technology and the issues of it provides him with a niche in an otherwise saturated industry. He also had some very impressive artists feature on his album, names such as Chance the Rapper, Azealia Banks and Jhene Aiko.

The instrumental solos in some of Gambino's tracks are stunning. The end of the track "II. Worldstar" has a beautiful sax solo, which not only gives it a jazz feel but also adds to the hopelessness of the song (picture lone man playing in a window of a large apartment building in New York). Also the interlude 'playing around before the party starts' features a dark, descending piano solo with light chatter in the background, foreshadowing a somber ending.

Each track of the album seems to be influenced by a different genre, genres such as jazz (as previously mentioned), hip hop, Iranian even, pop and r n' b especially. Also many of the songs have ethereal and magical (for lack of a better word) sounding instrumentals, which provides an unworldly element to the track. For example "i. the worst guys", "i. pink toes" and "iii. life: the biggest troll". However I think that these ethereal sounds are used to echo the lyrics and the theme of the song. Take the track "i. pink toes" for example, the first line of this track is "rainbows, sunshine everywhere we go". These lyrics create images of a utopian world, which I believe Gambino is trying to reinforce with the use of his instrumentals, therefore reiterating to his audience that this perfect world is unrealistic.

Some highlights of this album for me are "i. pink toes", purely because of the stunning vocals and the melody line is catchy. Also "v. 3005" because I enjoy the rhythm of the song and how it moves (and probably because my friend and I know the whole rap - I'm not even going to pretend I'm not proud of that fact). Lastly "ii. shadows" because it was the first song I heard from Childish Gambino and I feel like it's a good place to start. However I always look back on my old reviews with different favourite songs, so it's probably going to change. All in all, it's a stellar album.

I give Childish Gambino's 'because the internet' a 4 out of 5 stars.