flatwoodsdaemon

Extended version of the review I wrote for RAVEPOP by r u s s e l b u c k on Rate Your Music, because I've been thinking about this album quite a bit recently.

This album had a similar effect on me as when I first watched Demon Slayer as a long time shounen fan. If this is your first exposure to this kind of music, I'd imagine you'd get a lot more out of it than I did. I like Demon Slayer, and I like this too, but I wasn't as impressed as I wanted to be by it - moreso the fault of being so familiar with the genre than anything RAVEPOP does, but I digress.

I agree with the general sentiment I've seen online that for such a provocative album cover, one that sparked as much controversy as it did (for what reason I'm not sure, it;'s a cartoon butt, there's not even hole), the album plays it far too safe. The cover almost works against the music itself, it feels like it's in direct contrast to the sound of the album. I'm being told by the lyrics/cover that this is something subversive, something daring, the album cover references furry pornographic sites and explicit content but it generally plays it extremely safe. You could play this in a lot of clubs and have it be well recieved even outside of a furry rave - that's not really giving "subversive" to me, and certainly not the cocky attitude portrayed in the cover.

The album's theme is generally "not giving a fuck" and just doing things because you want to, and if Russelbuck had fun with this album, then I guess its has succeeded in that sense, considering it's mission statement, but it rings a little hollow when it sounds so by-the-books.

Which makes me a bit sad because: I loved "Just Be Competent". It's an outlier in the album for actually delving into the furry aspect of the album as a capital T Theme and not just an aesthetic layer. It's catchy too, it's the reason it's the song from RAVEPOP that has managed to go viral. Just Be Competent taps into, I think, autistic anxiety, with lyrics like "Nobody outs behavioural Frankenstein" and "these sweet instincts ruin my life". The character at the centre of Just Be Competent is socially isolated, and feels like their personality is stitched together (like Frankenstein's monster) from parts of people they think of as being successful and funny. Furry is all about examining what a "human being is gotta be like", as the song puts it, and embracing sweet instincts, both in a fun cartoony mascot way and in ways that is more akin to therianthropy (which I've discussed previously on this blog). It's super resonant, the one song from RAVEPOP that I return to time and time again, and...

Whilst writing this, I went to listen to "Just Be Competent" again, and noticed something in the description of the YouTube upload that I hadn't before, as I'd listened entirely on Apple Music prior. "Just Be Competent" is a remix/bootleg of "Impostor Syndrome" by Sidney Gish. Not a bad thing, not plagiarism, I love music that samples and remixes, but it does mean all the lyricism I just praised Just Be Competent and Russelbuck for, I can't actually attribute to him. The one thing I can really attribute to him (lyrically, anyway) is putting those lyrics through a furry lens, which reinforces the themes more than it does totally recontextualise it, which I'd prefer from something borrowing so many elements from something else.

For example, Patricia Taxxon sings the entirety of "Senorita" by Camila Cebello and Shawn Mendes in her album "Foley Artist", but she does so whilst sobbing, and on the tracklist it follows about five other songs all about gender dysphoria - within this context, Senorita becomes a melancholic song about loving being called a woman but wishing you didn't ("I wish I could pretend I didn't need ya..").

To reiterate, I believe very strongly in what as a non-musician I'm going to dub "music anarchy", one of my favourite albums is HELLHOUND which is near entirely that, remixing is entirely it's own form of lyricism in my eyes, but I find it odd that I didn't know "Just Be Competent" was one long sample until I checked a description - with how viral it's gotten I would've preferred Russelbuck try and promote the original creator he got the lyrics and vocals from as much as possible. Because let's be real, it's not the mixing/production that your average person is liking Just Be Competent for - it's the lyrics. If so much of something I made, to say this a little harshly, was jacked from someone else, I'd make sure EVERYONE knew it!

So I guess that means there isn't really a stand-out song in RAVEPOP to me. The other song I kind of connected to on a thematic/lyrical level was "Too Many People", but only for the very surface-level reason that it's the sort of thing that runs through my head when someone says hello at a convention, but its production is just okay.

That being said, perhaps I'm being too harsh.. as focus/background music, this album rocks. It's not quite as stim-inducing and hyperactive as Hikikiomori Days is for me, but it functions extremely well as trance music, I've drawn a lot of things to this album. I said earlier that it would play well at normie raves, and well, that's not a bad thing! RAVEPOP is best enjoyed as one RYM commenter put it, like "some random URL festival DJ set and not a cohesive album". "Not giving a fuck" fits for the album's theme as none of the song's themes particularly tie together, and the quality is up and down, and if this is to Russelbuck what my art was for me this year, a return to just "having fun" with art and not trying to make things overly-polished and perfect, then this album is a success. It's certainly good enough for me to hope I see it at furry convention raves for the forseeable future!