Given the hype surrounding Donald Glover's FX show "Atlanta," one could be forgiven if they forgot that Glover's rap alter ego Childish Gambino was supposed to drop an album in September. It appears that Gambino waited into the conclusion of season one of "Atlanta" before releasing the album; the intriguingly titled Awaken, My Love! will hit stores on December 2.
Unlike a lot of rappers, Gambino has not released snippets or any indication of what creative line he has pursued on this album. Today, he released the first song from the album, "Me and Your Mama." GAMBINO SZN has officially begun. With Awaken, My Love! only three weeks away, click through the gallery to learn all there is to know about the project.
It might be his last album under the nom de guerre 'Childish Gambino'
Childish Gambino isn't long for this world. In early 2015, a few months after he released STN MTN / Kauai, Glover revealed that he was considering retiring the rap alias he famously got from a Wu-Tang name generator.
I always want to do music. But I guess Childish Gambino is a period in my art time. I want to have periods in my life,” he told Today. “I feel like Childish Gambino is a period that should come to a close. I like endings.”
“I look at my life as something you should be able to paint," he added. "I think it is kinda like performance art.”
Pharos was LIT
For $100, Gambino fans obtained the right to attend a private camping excursion in the shroomy Californian desert known as Joshua Tree. PHAROS, it was called. There, Gambino, clad in glow-in-the-dark body paint and waist-length hair extensions and backed by a full band, performed 70 minutes of new music in a futuristic dome.
Phones were not allowed inside the dome, however footage from the show did inevitably find its way online...
#PHAROS in review:
• 12 songs
• Concept album with creepy tribal vibe
• Funk/jazz hybrid
• Minimal rapping
• Creatively different
It may feature a 50-piece choir
Last June, Gambino hit the studio in Los Angeles with "50 of the best singers in LA," according to Aaron Michael Gutierrez. Gambino and his choir cut five new songs. Perhaps the background vocals on "Me and Your Mama" were recorded during this very session?
Me and Your Mama
"Me and Your Mama"
Earlier today, Gambino debuted the leadoff track to Awaken, My Love! -- "Me and Your Mama," an expansive, genre-bending, six-minute track broken up into three distinct sections.
The first part is wondrous, psychedelic, and nocturnal, as if the soundtrack to a million fireflies drifting over a field of wildflowers at night. The second part is a rambling and bluesy rock number, somewhere inbetween Led Zeppelin and Tame Impala. The third part sounds like a jazzy, wobbly BadBadNotGood deconstruction of the second part.
Gambino is present primarily only for the second section; on "Me and Your Mama," the reins are firmly in the hands of his go-to producer Ludwig Goransson.
Listen below:
Tracklist
It is difficult to gain insight into an album solely from the tracklist. But between "Me and Your Mama" and the tracklist, one can hypototheize that Awaken, My Love! is a kaleidoscopic voyage through the psyche of Childish Gambino as he attempts to seduce your mom.