Ghostemane - N / O / I / S / E Album Review

American Rapper Eric Whitney, performing under the name Ghostemane, has gained huge popularity in the last couple of years through songs like 'Mercury: Retrograde', 'Andromeda', and his work with other artists like the track '1000 Rounds' with Pouya. I enjoy all of these songs and and personally found out about him from his collaborative music with Suicideboys. Ghostemane in the past has made dark, aggressive, bass-heavy, atmospheric rap music, with a hint of metal/hard rock influence in his last album Hexada. which I was a big fan of. His popularity and various social media activity generated a lot of hype among his fanbase, me included, for the next release.

This hype was answered on October 9th, when the single 'Flesh' was released, alongside a live video of the track being performed by Ghostemane in an abandoned house to a group of his most die-hard fans. And what an amazing track it is. This sub-two minute banger shows off both his ability to rap and scream, as the track switches between incredibly heavy, noisy breakdowns and raw, aggressive verses. It turned out to be a very accurate preview of the full album, which was dropped the next day.

N / O / I / S / E is the name of the ~30 minute long, 12 track record, and noise is what you get. Almost every track on here is loud, abrasive, and uncompromisingly heavy. Ghostemane delivers self-reflective, dark, angry lyrics in a huge variety of vocal styles, including his signature high-pitched rapping, screams, clean singing, spoken word, low rapping, and a Marilyn-Mason-style monotone rasp. The vocal performance on this album is a clear highlight, with tracks such as 'Nihil', 'Bonesaw', and 'Gatteka' all demonstrating Ghostemane's ability to make his wide array of vocal talents work together in the same song. On "Flesh" which I mentioned earlier, and a few other songs, the distorted noise effects in the production blend at times with his screams, to create a single devastatingly heavy sound, brutally awesome stuff.

Production-wise, this album offers the standard trap-hi-hats and bass drops that any modern underground rap fan should be used to, but we also hear some live-recorded drums, distorted guitars, and straight-up white noise samples in some of these songs. The way Ghostemane uses noise to fill gaps at the end of bars and as an instrument in its own right, is reminiscent of recent artists like Code Orange or Death Grips, which I am sure have both influenced him a lot in his writing decisions. These elements often all culminate into final crushing breakdowns at the end of songs like 'Flesh' and 'Bonesaw', and pulsing choruses in songs like 'Ballgag' and 'Gatteka'.

Of course Ghostemane can't be starting mosh pits for the whole album. The songs 'Androids Dream of Electric Sheep' (awesome song title) and 'My Heart of Glass' take a break from the relentless ear-destruction and bass-thumping to create ambiance and show that he can product more than just noisy rap beats. These songs use softer synths, spoken word samples, and acoustic guitar to create a relaxing, beautiful soundscape. 'Androids..' indeed sounds like something Hans Zimmer would put together for a space opera. These tracks are the exception when it comes to heaviness, not the norm, and they don't feel like forced additions, coming across to me as authentic as the rest of the record.

The gripes I have with N / O / I / S / E are few, but this album is not perfect. I wasn't very impressed by the opening track 'Intro.Desolation', I felt the singing and noises lacked substance and purpose, it just felt like a cliched first track that he might have felt obligated to include. I definitely don't think it was necessary and would have preferred the album just start with the second track 'Nihil' instead. Don't waste my time with a purposeless intro track. A couple of the songs also seem like they are trying to maintain the heaviness of the rest, but just come across as weak and edgy, like a lame early 2000s nu metal song. 'Inside' and 'Black  Blood' are the culprits and they fail to hype me up like the rest of the heavy tracks do. The lyrics don't help their case either, with "I think I was born in the wrong generation" being a stand out for the wrong reasons, I hope Ghostemane was being ironic here. Thankfully, both of these songs include great second-halves, where they pick up the pace and quality to match the rest of the tunes.

I've been listening to this album almost non-stop since it came out. It goes hard in the gym, in the car, and even lying on the couch playing Rocket League, I've enjoyed it in all these settings. Ghostemane has absolutely stepped up from the already great Hexada and delivered a fine bunch of noisy, genre-bending songs. Listen to it for yourself and let me know what you think! I'd love to discuss this with you all.

Favourite tracks: Flesh, Ballgag, Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Gatteka.

For fans of: SuicideBoys, Pouya, Code Orange, Hip Hop and Nu Metal in general.

- Digital Caveman