Berry Weight keep it minimal
Berry Weight is a collaborative effort between Canadian and Swiss musicians Apewok and Stab. It is mainly instrumental hip-hop but depth and personality are added in capacious amounts by singer Astrid Engberg (whose voice is sultry and wistful) and clarinetist Kledsy Jy (bringing back the clarinet in a big way) whose contributions make an indelible impression.
The general tone is laid back and slightly melancholy while production is flawless. This is exactly the sort of album you want to play when you are either recovering from a hangover or trying to impress someone so they’ll sleep with you. In fact the only fault I can find is the mid-song rap from ASM (on “The Lotus”); which is frankly comical and disturbs an otherwise great song.
It may not feature on any of the hipster lists of albums this year (indeed at times it’s like this album has been teleported in from the early nineties) but unlike an awful lot of music that is “forward thinking” you might actually want to listen to this more than once.
Kim Monaghan
