WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.120 You know, usually when we pull the data for these 00:00:02.120 --> 00:00:04.299 deep dives, there's a pretty consistent story. 00:00:04.500 --> 00:00:06.839 You look at a classic album, the data looks classic, 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:10.039 high scores all around. Right. Consensus is usually 00:00:10.039 --> 00:00:12.320 pretty easy to spot. We like to think we all, 00:00:12.460 --> 00:00:15.169 you know... generally agree on what's good but 00:00:15.169 --> 00:00:18.890 today we are looking at a set of numbers that 00:00:18.890 --> 00:00:21.089 honestly just shouldn't exist for the same album 00:00:21.089 --> 00:00:25.149 we're talking about a record from 2016 that was 00:00:25.149 --> 00:00:28.070 simultaneously dismissed as forgettable by some 00:00:28.070 --> 00:00:31.129 of the biggest taste makers and yet literally 00:00:31.129 --> 00:00:34.409 crowned album of the year by others it's a true 00:00:34.409 --> 00:00:37.289 statistical anomaly depending on which column 00:00:37.289 --> 00:00:39.469 of the spreadsheet you look at this album is 00:00:39.469 --> 00:00:42.539 either a throwaway joke or an absolute masterpiece. 00:00:42.880 --> 00:00:44.700 And the album at the center of this whole storm 00:00:44.700 --> 00:00:48.280 is BBF, hosted by DJ Escrow. The Dig You Studio 00:00:48.280 --> 00:00:51.020 album by the British group Babyfather. I have 00:00:51.020 --> 00:00:53.240 to say, if that name Babyfather sounds a bit 00:00:53.240 --> 00:00:57.140 like a provocation or a joke, you're already 00:00:57.140 --> 00:00:58.840 halfway to understanding this record, aren't 00:00:58.840 --> 00:01:00.119 you? Oh, definitely. You have to look at who's 00:01:00.119 --> 00:01:02.579 involved. The driving force here is Dean Blunt. 00:01:02.659 --> 00:01:05.239 And if you follow experimental music at all... 00:01:05.450 --> 00:01:07.930 You know, Dean Blunt is basically the master 00:01:07.930 --> 00:01:10.670 of this lo -fi, almost troll -level performance 00:01:10.670 --> 00:01:13.510 art. He just loves blurring those lines. And 00:01:13.510 --> 00:01:16.349 he's joined by this character, DJ Escrow, and 00:01:16.349 --> 00:01:19.769 a third member, Gasman D. The lineup itself is 00:01:19.769 --> 00:01:21.829 a bit of a mystery. Character is the perfect 00:01:21.829 --> 00:01:24.689 word. The whole project is just wrapped in Enigma. 00:01:25.970 --> 00:01:28.530 So the mission for this deep dive isn't just 00:01:28.530 --> 00:01:31.269 to review an album. It's to figure out how a 00:01:31.269 --> 00:01:33.609 single piece of music can fracture the critical 00:01:33.609 --> 00:01:36.890 landscape so violently. Is it a masterpiece or 00:01:36.890 --> 00:01:39.909 a mess? And why can't anyone seem to agree? Well, 00:01:39.950 --> 00:01:41.569 to answer that, we have to look at how it was 00:01:41.569 --> 00:01:44.290 released. With Dean Blunt, the context is usually 00:01:44.290 --> 00:01:46.269 just as important as the content itself. Well, 00:01:46.349 --> 00:01:48.250 looking at the release data, the context basically 00:01:48.250 --> 00:01:52.000 screams prank. It dropped on April 1st, 2016. 00:01:52.340 --> 00:01:55.120 April Fool's Day. Exactly. And it was released 00:01:55.120 --> 00:01:57.340 on Hyperdub. Now, for anyone who doesn't know, 00:01:57.480 --> 00:01:59.859 Hyperdub is massive. That's the label founded 00:01:59.859 --> 00:02:02.099 by Code 9. It's the home of Burial. It's known 00:02:02.099 --> 00:02:04.319 for, you know, serious, dark, intellectual, electronic 00:02:04.319 --> 00:02:07.200 music. So you have this prestigious, super serious 00:02:07.200 --> 00:02:09.240 label. And then they dropped this album on April 00:02:09.240 --> 00:02:11.479 Fool's Day. It feels like they were daring you 00:02:11.479 --> 00:02:14.780 not to take it seriously. Or daring you to find 00:02:14.780 --> 00:02:17.659 the truth inside the joke. You have to remember, 00:02:17.780 --> 00:02:20.379 in 2016, Dean Blunt was coming off projects like 00:02:20.379 --> 00:02:23.800 Hype Williams. He thrives on that tension. Is 00:02:23.800 --> 00:02:26.060 he making fun of us, or is this the most sincere 00:02:26.060 --> 00:02:27.919 thing he's ever done? And we should probably 00:02:27.919 --> 00:02:31.479 clarify, despite the debut tag, Babyfather was 00:02:31.479 --> 00:02:34.159 really active in 2016. They had other releases 00:02:34.159 --> 00:02:38.199 like Platinum Tears and 419, but this one, BBF, 00:02:38.259 --> 00:02:40.280 this was the big one. This was the studio album 00:02:40.280 --> 00:02:42.539 statement. The main event. The genre tags we 00:02:42.539 --> 00:02:46.039 have are experimental, hip -hop, and dub. But 00:02:46.039 --> 00:02:48.159 if you go in expecting a standard hip -hop record, 00:02:48.379 --> 00:02:50.659 you're going to be so confused. Oh, yeah. It 00:02:50.659 --> 00:02:52.919 sounds less like a polished album and more like 00:02:52.919 --> 00:02:55.860 a broken radio. That's the DJ Escrow influence. 00:02:56.139 --> 00:02:58.419 The album is framed as a pirate radio broadcast. 00:02:58.939 --> 00:03:01.740 You have this host, Escrow, just shouting over 00:03:01.740 --> 00:03:04.099 tracks, cutting things off, ranting. It's aggressive. 00:03:04.419 --> 00:03:06.379 Which totally explains the track list structure. 00:03:06.520 --> 00:03:08.120 I was looking at the metadata, and it's just 00:03:08.120 --> 00:03:10.969 overwhelming. 23 tracks. It looks like a lot 00:03:10.969 --> 00:03:12.710 on paper, for sure. But then you look closer, 00:03:12.830 --> 00:03:15.050 and the runtime is just under 50 minutes. Yeah. 00:03:15.110 --> 00:03:17.069 So the math implies a lot of these aren't really 00:03:17.069 --> 00:03:19.530 songs in the way we think of them. They're shards. 00:03:20.009 --> 00:03:22.030 Little fragments. I mean, look at this. You've 00:03:22.030 --> 00:03:24.949 got escrow, then escrow 2, then escrow 3. Uh 00:03:24.949 --> 00:03:27.610 -huh. Escrow 2 is literally 25 seconds long. 00:03:27.949 --> 00:03:31.469 Escrow 3 is 29 seconds. And message is 50 seconds. 00:03:31.650 --> 00:03:34.810 It's just incredibly aggressive pacing. Just 00:03:34.810 --> 00:03:36.490 when you think you're settling into a groove, 00:03:36.729 --> 00:03:38.990 the album just changes the channel on you. It's 00:03:38.990 --> 00:03:43.080 anti -flow. A normal album wants to seduce you 00:03:43.080 --> 00:03:46.139 to keep you listening. This album is constantly 00:03:46.139 --> 00:03:48.539 interrupting itself. It's like it's mimicking 00:03:48.539 --> 00:03:51.240 that experience of just scanning the radio dial 00:03:51.240 --> 00:03:54.259 or maybe the fragmented attention span of the 00:03:54.259 --> 00:03:57.000 Internet age. It refuses to let you get comfortable. 00:03:57.280 --> 00:04:00.000 It really does. But, OK, amidst all that noise 00:04:00.000 --> 00:04:02.360 and interruption in these 20 second skits, there 00:04:02.360 --> 00:04:04.680 are some serious heavy hitters in the credits. 00:04:04.900 --> 00:04:07.180 I actually did a double take when I saw the production 00:04:07.180 --> 00:04:10.719 list. You saw Arca. I saw Arca. That is not a 00:04:10.719 --> 00:04:13.060 name you expect to see buried in the liner notes 00:04:13.060 --> 00:04:15.719 of what some people called a prank album. No, 00:04:15.800 --> 00:04:17.839 Arca is electronic royalty. We're talking high 00:04:17.839 --> 00:04:21.360 definition, avant -garde sound design. Arca's 00:04:21.360 --> 00:04:24.920 worked with Bjork, Kanye West, FKA Twigs. So 00:04:24.920 --> 00:04:29.100 how does a producer known for that pristine, 00:04:29.100 --> 00:04:33.079 high -tech sound fit into this lo -fi pirate 00:04:33.079 --> 00:04:36.500 radio thing? Paradoxically, Arca is on three 00:04:36.500 --> 00:04:38.579 tracks. There's meditation. which was actually 00:04:38.579 --> 00:04:40.339 the lead single. That one's a full song, right? 00:04:40.420 --> 00:04:41.860 It's up in five minutes. It is. It's a centerpiece. 00:04:41.920 --> 00:04:44.040 It kind of grounds the album. It shows that they 00:04:44.040 --> 00:04:46.620 can make a real song if they want to. Okay. But 00:04:46.620 --> 00:04:49.000 then in true baby father fashion, look at the 00:04:49.000 --> 00:04:51.959 track Beneaths. It's also credited as featuring 00:04:51.959 --> 00:04:55.060 Arca. I'm looking at it now. It's 39 seconds 00:04:55.060 --> 00:04:57.259 long. That's the punchline. You get one of the 00:04:57.259 --> 00:04:59.579 world's most talented in -demand producers in 00:04:59.579 --> 00:05:01.699 the studio with you, and you use a 39 -second 00:05:01.699 --> 00:05:03.899 snippet. It's a flex. It's absolutely a flex. 00:05:03.959 --> 00:05:05.339 It's saying, we don't need to give you the pop 00:05:05.339 --> 00:05:07.399 banger you want. We're giving you this atmosphere. 00:05:07.949 --> 00:05:10.569 It completely subverts the whole idea of a feature. 00:05:10.750 --> 00:05:13.790 There's also a feature from Mika too on God Hour. 00:05:13.930 --> 00:05:17.370 Micah Levi, yes. Another genius from the British 00:05:17.370 --> 00:05:20.269 experimental scene. So despite the whole April 00:05:20.269 --> 00:05:23.009 Fool's rapper and the chaotic structure, the 00:05:23.009 --> 00:05:25.569 people involved here are incredibly highbrow. 00:05:25.589 --> 00:05:28.519 This isn't just a throwaway mixtape. That tension 00:05:28.519 --> 00:05:31.240 is fascinating. You have these high art collaborators, 00:05:31.500 --> 00:05:34.220 a legendary label, but the album's structure 00:05:34.220 --> 00:05:37.160 is designed to alienate you. It is. You have 00:05:37.160 --> 00:05:39.600 these massive bookends, stealth intro is five 00:05:39.600 --> 00:05:42.180 minutes, stealth outro is three and a half, and 00:05:42.180 --> 00:05:44.779 then this chaotic middle where songs barely last 00:05:44.779 --> 00:05:47.620 a minute. It forces you to work. You can't just 00:05:47.620 --> 00:05:49.160 put this on in the background at a dinner party. 00:05:49.240 --> 00:05:52.060 It demands your attention, mostly by just annoying 00:05:52.060 --> 00:05:54.250 you until you pay attention. Which brings us 00:05:54.250 --> 00:05:56.670 right to the reception, because clearly a lot 00:05:56.670 --> 00:05:59.129 of critics did not want to do the work. That 00:05:59.129 --> 00:06:00.670 is one way to put it, yeah. So let's look at 00:06:00.670 --> 00:06:03.370 the average view first. The aggregate data, Metacritic 00:06:03.370 --> 00:06:06.149 has it at a 72. I feel safe. It's the gentleman's 00:06:06.149 --> 00:06:09.970 seven. In music journalism, a 72 usually means 00:06:09.970 --> 00:06:12.689 I respect that this is art and I don't want to 00:06:12.689 --> 00:06:14.910 look stupid, but I didn't actually enjoy it. 00:06:15.110 --> 00:06:19.069 Any decent music has it even lower, 6 .8. And 00:06:19.069 --> 00:06:21.250 when you dig into the reviews from the big publications, 00:06:21.490 --> 00:06:24.029 you just see a lot of shrugging. Pitchfork gave 00:06:24.029 --> 00:06:27.610 it a 6 .0. And in Pitchfork math, a 6 .0 is basically 00:06:27.610 --> 00:06:30.970 purgatory. It's a do not touch. Pop matters, 00:06:31.250 --> 00:06:34.009 a 6. The quietest, who usually live for this 00:06:34.009 --> 00:06:36.490 kind of weirdness, gave it a 6. Even The Wire 00:06:36.490 --> 00:06:39.589 gave it a 7. And they cover literal noise music. 00:06:39.610 --> 00:06:41.850 So the consensus from the establishment was, 00:06:42.009 --> 00:06:45.129 interesting experiment. But too messy. They likely 00:06:45.129 --> 00:06:47.670 saw the repetition, the 22nd tracks, the shouting 00:06:47.670 --> 00:06:50.009 DJ, and just saw it as undercooked. Exactly. 00:06:50.110 --> 00:06:52.170 They treated it like a failed hip -hop album 00:06:52.170 --> 00:06:54.189 instead of a successful piece of conceptual art. 00:06:54.290 --> 00:06:56.920 But here. This is where the data gets wild, because 00:06:56.920 --> 00:06:59.139 if you just looked at those scores, the sixes 00:06:59.139 --> 00:07:01.360 and the sevens, you'd write the album off completely. 00:07:01.699 --> 00:07:03.519 But then you have this other group of critics 00:07:03.519 --> 00:07:05.759 who treated it like the Holy Grail. True believers. 00:07:06.199 --> 00:07:08.939 Mixmag drops an 8 out of 10. Resident Advisor, 00:07:09.220 --> 00:07:10.959 which is like the Bible for electronic music, 00:07:11.100 --> 00:07:14.360 gives it a 4 .1 out of 5. That is a serious endorsement. 00:07:14.459 --> 00:07:16.720 It is. But the real shocker comes when you look 00:07:16.720 --> 00:07:19.399 at the year -end lists. Right. Let's just set 00:07:19.399 --> 00:07:22.870 the stage. 2016 was a monster year for music. 00:07:22.990 --> 00:07:24.790 We're talking about history -making releases. 00:07:25.089 --> 00:07:27.449 Massive. Absolutely massive. You had Beyonce 00:07:27.449 --> 00:07:30.470 with Lemonade. Frank Ocean finally dropped Blonde. 00:07:30.589 --> 00:07:32.829 David Bowie left us with Blackstar. Titans of 00:07:32.829 --> 00:07:35.129 Industry. Culture -shifting albums. And yet, 00:07:35.189 --> 00:07:37.509 when Tiny Mixtapes released their favorite 50 00:07:37.509 --> 00:07:41.269 music releases of 2016, who was number one? It 00:07:41.269 --> 00:07:43.889 wasn't Beyonce. It was Babyfather. Number one. 00:07:44.360 --> 00:07:47.040 Above Lemonade. Above Blackstar. And they weren't 00:07:47.040 --> 00:07:49.660 the only ones. Resident Advisor also named it 00:07:49.660 --> 00:07:52.199 their number one album of 2016. I just want to 00:07:52.199 --> 00:07:54.300 pause on that. How do you reconcile that? How 00:07:54.300 --> 00:07:56.939 does the same album get a 6 .0 from Pitchfork 00:07:56.939 --> 00:07:59.079 and the number one spot from Resident Advisor? 00:07:59.439 --> 00:08:01.740 It all comes down to what you value in art. If 00:08:01.740 --> 00:08:05.019 you value polish, song structure, emotional directness 00:08:05.019 --> 00:08:07.540 like Blonde or Lemonade Babyfather is going to 00:08:07.540 --> 00:08:10.279 annoy you. It's antagonistic. It is definitely 00:08:10.279 --> 00:08:12.500 not holding your hand. But if you value conceptual 00:08:12.500 --> 00:08:16.329 rigor. If you value music that reflects the confusion 00:08:16.329 --> 00:08:18.850 and the noise of the time, then this album is 00:08:18.850 --> 00:08:21.310 a masterpiece. It captures a mood that those 00:08:21.310 --> 00:08:23.829 polished pop albums just couldn't touch. So the 00:08:23.829 --> 00:08:26.290 critics who loved it saw the fragmentation not 00:08:26.290 --> 00:08:29.689 as a flaw, but as the entire point. Precisely. 00:08:29.750 --> 00:08:32.210 They saw it as a portrait of a fractured society. 00:08:32.769 --> 00:08:35.669 The DJ escrow character isn't just an annoyance. 00:08:35.889 --> 00:08:38.070 He's the voice of the underground that's usually 00:08:38.070 --> 00:08:40.830 ignored, shouting about the reality of the city. 00:08:41.120 --> 00:08:43.159 It's also interesting that The Wire, who gave 00:08:43.159 --> 00:08:45.759 it that lukewarm seven at first, ended up putting 00:08:45.759 --> 00:08:48.639 it at number 15 on their best releases of 2016 00:08:48.639 --> 00:08:51.539 list. It grew on them. And that's the sign of 00:08:51.539 --> 00:08:53.779 a challenging record. It confuses you at first. 00:08:53.899 --> 00:08:56.179 You might even dislike it. But it sticks in your 00:08:56.179 --> 00:08:57.919 brain. You find yourself thinking about those 00:08:57.919 --> 00:09:00.659 escrow skits days later. And Resident Advisor 00:09:00.659 --> 00:09:03.639 even doubled down, putting it on their top albums 00:09:03.639 --> 00:09:06.779 of the 2010s list. So this wasn't just a 2016 00:09:06.779 --> 00:09:10.080 fluke for them. It had legs. It aged well because 00:09:10.080 --> 00:09:13.019 the world got more chaotic, not less. That sense 00:09:13.019 --> 00:09:15.700 of disorientation the album creates feels even 00:09:15.700 --> 00:09:17.929 more relevant now than it did then. It really 00:09:17.929 --> 00:09:20.129 makes you wonder about aggregate scores like 00:09:20.129 --> 00:09:22.669 Metacritic. We see that 72 and we think average, 00:09:22.750 --> 00:09:24.990 we think mediocre. But in this case, the 72 is 00:09:24.990 --> 00:09:26.830 actually an average of, I hate this and this 00:09:26.830 --> 00:09:28.490 is the greatest thing I've ever heard. Which 00:09:28.490 --> 00:09:30.889 is arguably a much more interesting score than 00:09:30.889 --> 00:09:33.289 a universal 8, isn't it? It suggests that polarization 00:09:33.289 --> 00:09:36.129 is a better indicator of interesting art than 00:09:36.129 --> 00:09:39.409 consensus is. I would agree with that. Safe art 00:09:39.409 --> 00:09:41.889 gets eights. Radical art gets ones and tens. 00:09:42.090 --> 00:09:44.929 If everyone agrees an album is pretty good, it 00:09:44.929 --> 00:09:47.250 probably didn't take any risks. Baby Father took 00:09:47.250 --> 00:09:49.809 every single risk. So for the listener who hasn't 00:09:49.809 --> 00:09:52.610 heard this yet, if they decide to dive in, they 00:09:52.610 --> 00:09:55.980 shouldn't go in expecting songs. No. Go in expecting 00:09:55.980 --> 00:09:59.779 a broadcast. Yeah. A collage. Listen to the transitions, 00:09:59.940 --> 00:10:03.059 how the escrow tracks disrupt everything. And 00:10:03.059 --> 00:10:05.000 pay attention to those moments where the beauty 00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:07.659 breaks through, like on Meditation or Deep. Deep 00:10:07.659 --> 00:10:09.419 is another one of those ARCA tracks, right? It 00:10:09.419 --> 00:10:12.059 is. It's three minutes, 11 seconds. It's dark, 00:10:12.179 --> 00:10:15.690 dubby. It's a glimpse of the pure musicality 00:10:15.690 --> 00:10:18.169 Dean Blunt is capable of when he stops pranking 00:10:18.169 --> 00:10:20.370 you for a moment. It's a reminder that Dean Blunt, 00:10:20.389 --> 00:10:22.970 Escrow, and Gasman D are just playing a different 00:10:22.970 --> 00:10:24.950 game than the rest of the industry. They aren't 00:10:24.950 --> 00:10:26.850 trying to win a Grammy. They're trying to mess 00:10:26.850 --> 00:10:29.730 with your head. They are trying to make you question 00:10:29.730 --> 00:10:33.659 what an album even is. And clearly for the folks 00:10:33.659 --> 00:10:35.840 at Resident Advisor and Tiny Mixtapes, it worked. 00:10:36.000 --> 00:10:38.299 It certainly did. It's funny looking back at 00:10:38.299 --> 00:10:40.100 those middle of the road reviews, the ones that 00:10:40.100 --> 00:10:42.500 gave it a six or seven, they often mention the 00:10:42.500 --> 00:10:45.460 potential being there but feeling unfulfilled. 00:10:45.639 --> 00:10:48.440 Which is so ironic because the unfulfilled feeling 00:10:48.440 --> 00:10:51.399 is the aesthetic. It's supposed to feel incomplete, 00:10:51.700 --> 00:10:53.659 like you missed the end of the song because the 00:10:53.659 --> 00:10:56.580 signal cut out. And that requires a real shift 00:10:56.580 --> 00:10:58.860 in how we listen. We are so used to completion. 00:10:59.299 --> 00:11:02.399 We want the hook. The verse, the chorus, the 00:11:02.399 --> 00:11:05.259 outro. And baby father gives you the hook, then 00:11:05.259 --> 00:11:09.580 static, then a skit, then silence. It's frustrating, 00:11:09.720 --> 00:11:12.519 but it's also exhilarating if you just let go 00:11:12.519 --> 00:11:14.480 of your expectations. Here's a thought to leave 00:11:14.480 --> 00:11:17.480 you with. We live in an era of algorithmic recommendation, 00:11:17.960 --> 00:11:20.919 right? Spotify and Apple Music, they want to 00:11:20.919 --> 00:11:22.860 feed you things you will like. They want smooth 00:11:22.860 --> 00:11:24.799 sailing. They want you to just keep the playlist 00:11:24.799 --> 00:11:27.720 running. Right. An album like BBF, which is prickly 00:11:27.720 --> 00:11:31.139 and difficult and just weird, is exactly the 00:11:31.139 --> 00:11:33.320 kind of thing an algorithm would bury. It breaks 00:11:33.320 --> 00:11:35.720 the pattern. It causes people to hit skip. It's 00:11:35.720 --> 00:11:39.639 friction. So does a 72 on Metacritic even matter 00:11:39.639 --> 00:11:41.820 if the people who connect with the work think 00:11:41.820 --> 00:11:44.059 it's the single best thing created that year? 00:11:44.779 --> 00:11:46.759 Maybe we should be seeking out the friction rather 00:11:46.759 --> 00:11:49.080 than letting the data smooth everything out for 00:11:49.080 --> 00:11:51.320 us. I think that's the only way you find the 00:11:51.320 --> 00:11:53.480 really good stuff. The stuff that actually changes 00:11:53.480 --> 00:11:55.960 how you hear music. Go give it a listen. Start 00:11:55.960 --> 00:11:57.879 with Stealth Intro and see if you can make it 00:11:57.879 --> 00:12:00.120 to Stealth Outro and decide which side of the 00:12:00.120 --> 00:12:03.460 divide you're on. Just don't let DJ Escrow scare 00:12:03.460 --> 00:12:06.179 you off. Thanks for diving dupe with us. We'll 00:12:06.179 --> 00:12:06.980 catch you on the next one.