We interrupt this review for a special news bulletin: Noise Filter Tapes #2 has been released! My mixtape for April 2013 features the best new music that came out this month, including new tracks from Daft Punk, Breakbot, Basement Jaxx, Grum, Soulwax, and more - go take a listen! Now back to your regularly scheduled album review.
If there's a word that best describes Major Lazer, it's fun. The side-project of American producer Diplo is known for merging a number of genres and recruiting an impressive array of guest singers. Elements of house, reggae, dubstep, hip hop, and trap come together into a concoction of music designed to make you dance like crazy. Back when the project was run by Diplo and Switch, tracks like "Pon De Floor" and "Hold The Line" set the bar for dance music with creativity and wide appeal.
While Guns Don't Kill People... Lazers Do was mainly a dancehall album with electro and pop elements scattered about, Free The Universe never settles on one style for too long. This makes it more varied, but it loses some of the focus that the first album had (though there was never really much focus to begin with). This isn't so much a cohesive album as it is a collection of songs. There's not very much connecting the laid-back jam of "Get Free" with the noisy dubstep of "Jah No Partial". The production, however, is solid, full of the thumping drumlines and wooping synthesizers that you can always expect from Major Lazer.
When it comes to guest spots, Free The Universe is like an ensemble comedy. Each performer brings their own element, for better or for worse. The line-up is more recognizable by the average listener than the first album's. Bruno Mars and Tyga show up on the exactly-what-you'd-think-it'd-sound-like "Bubble Butt", but oddly, the latter is more prominent than the latter. Shaggy is also here, but he has to strain his voice over the rave sirens of "Keep Cool". The most oddball performance here is by Peaches, whose delirious rapping adorns the delectably wierd Halloween beach party jam "Scare Me". Laidback Luke, The Partysquad, and Flux Pavillion show up to co-produce some of the most energetic songs on the album, with the help of a few lively rappers ("Sweat", "Mashup The Dance"). The best parts of the album come when the energy is turned down a little, like "Jessica", in which Vampire Weekend's Ezra Koenig sings in dreamy falsetto over a laidback reggae beat.
Overall, the album is a mixed bag. Not necessarily hit-or-miss, but rather hit-or-"just okay". There are excellent songs on here, but they're laid in with not-somemorable ones. The Wyclef Jean-featuring "Reach For The Stars", for example, aims for an inspirational message, but falls flat. Other than that, the more emotional songs are mixed in well with the dance-a-thon party anthems. Any song on this album could be released as a single and obtain success, a testament to Diplo's anti-filler mindset. If his goal was to give each track a mind and flavor of its own, he's definitely succeeded.
Favorite tracks: "Jessica", "Scare Me", "Watch Out For This (Bumaye)", "Sweat", "Playground"
Least favorite track: "Reach For The Stars"
My score: 7 out of 10.
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