Asher Roth — Flowers On The Weekend — Album Review
Alternative Hip-Hop
Listen on Spotify | Listen on Apple Music
With most of the reviews I have made for albums this year, they are from artists that I’ve newly discovered through Spotify, or from artists whose music I was already a fan of. But with Asher Roth, and his newest album Flowers On The Weekend, I had discovered everything as simply a recommendation from a friend.
My friend had most likely been following this artist for a while, and wanted to share the news of the upcoming album with me. He sent over one of the teaser tracks “Hunnid”, and from there, I kept my eyes and ears out for the full album to drop.
The date of that albums release, I would’ve thought to have been on a Friday. But thankfully, we were treated to Flowers On The Weekend one day before. Although, it did have to go through a re-upload on Spotify the following day.
When I discovered the American rapper, I was surprised to discover that he had been making music for as long as he had, with his debut album Asleep In The Bread Aisle being released back in 2009. But fast forward to his third studio album, more than a decade later, and his experience definitely shows, both in the production he uses, and a lot of his lyricisms.
Listeners were treated quite generously with summer-mood albums this week. While we had the likes of Ivan Ave’s warm and colourful sound on Double Goodbyes, I feel that the warmth of the production found on this album is more energetic and engaging, as opposed to the more indulgent and chilled aesthetic of Ivan Ave’s album.
Asher Roth utilises a lot of varying instrumental elements in the production, which range from jazz trumpets to reverberating guitar licks. He also enlists a good cast of interesting features on here too, which include Buddy, Lil Yachty, Joyce Wrice, and more. Each of these features I think leave their mark on the tracks they feature in, while Asher Roth remains the driving force of the album.
The colourful instrumentation, and the upbeat warmth of the album gives it an incredibly festive mood; one that I am sure will go down an absolute treat in the remaining summer we’ll hopefully have after lockdown. This mood I feel, is the strongest thing that this album has to offer. And when it comes to offering pure enjoyment, this album is definitely up there.
This is why the handful of songs I’m not so crazy about on this album, all seem to have more of a downbeat approach instead. Almost all of them also have Asher Roth trying out something that wasn’t entirely rapping, and was instead going for something more melodic. While there are tracks that I do enjoy which take a similar melodic approach, the majority seemed to be clear misses for me.
Needless to say however, what this album did most successfully for me was display just how much experience this rap artist has garnered. His flows are so smooth at this point, that rapping almost seems like second nature to him.
While the track-list is not perfect by any means, Flowers On The Weekend really shines as a feel-good and highly enjoyable rap album. Needless to say, it will likely grow on me even more as time goes on.
Favourite Tracks: Way More Fun | Hunnid | Back Of The Class
Least Favourite Track: Dark Chocolate
Retrohash
