- Rapping and producing a full project for the first time, the UK artist blends confrontational hip-hop and club music on this fierce LP.
- For Iceboy Violet, dreaming is a lifeline. Whether they're dexterously rapping and teetering in high heels over a pile of old sneakers, or bathing the voices of trap artists like Lil Durk and Young Thug in warm ambience, their work is carefully and intentionally constructed. On last year's debut mixtape, The Vanity Project, the Manchester artist collaborated with experimental club producers like Space Afrika, aya and Mun Sing, who chiselled out obscure and often harsh sonic landscapes that juxtaposed the intimate topics of gender and identity that Iceboy Violet rapped about. It was a deliberate choice to dress hip-hop in a new wardrobe. On their latest album, Not A Dream But A Controlled Explosion, Iceboy Violet cinches that mantlet at the waist with a belt of bone, gold, copper and burnt orange. It's the first time they're both producing and rapping on their own record, which sees them direct their dreams into something more powerful—manicured chaos touching on macho rap, dubstep, dancehall and more.
With Not A Dream But A Controlled Explosion, Iceboy Violet looks at desire as a driving force, which, from a non-binary and trans perspective, often relates to self-definition and a love of the self. The album is remarkably direct. "Street Dogs Have Wings" erupts out of the thick ambient mist of "Not A Dream (Intro)" as Violet raps, "Looking for heaven in love and code / ones and ohs / All that glitters gold / Dirty hands been mining / Dying stars been shining / It comes and it goes," over a booming trap beat. It feels like a stream of consciousness flow, as if they're sharing long pent-up thoughts and feelings. This intensity carries right through to the album's dancehall closer, "Pablo's Cathedral," where Iceboy Violet brings things full circle, repeating: "Looking for heaven in love and code / ones and ohs" followed by the cut-off phrase: "If you see it lemme know / I want a—." They draw attention to the process of finding self-love as never ending, a destination that can feel endlessly hard to reach.
There are tender moments between the explosive ones. "Black Gold," featuring fellow Manchester rapper Florence Sinclair, shifts up and down between major and minor chords to create a visceral emotional tug in Sinclair's words: "Freedom is a must / All I know is lust / All I know is pain / All I know is change / Nothing be the same." They highlight the need for self-definition in a binary world, and how the ability to do so is often hard won. "Paris, Bradford" harks back to Iceboy Violet's noise days, as their voice sits in a swelling fog of ghostly harmonies that pressurise lines like "Ditch your mans / And come and find me in our own personal Eden / Got lost in your twists and turns." This time it's not clear exactly who they're talking to—themselves or a lover—but their words feel palpably intimate, made all the closer by the track's claustrophobic feel.
On "Ekklipse," one of the album's more danceable tracks, Iceboy Violet raps over a buzzing dubstep beat, transporting listeners to Sub Dub (a popular destination for sound system music in Leeds). Violet sounds cocky, chest puffed out, as they spit lines like "Likkle man thinks he's big / Headlight gawker," playing with the kind of aggressive, masculine tropes their work usually denounces. Music allowed Violet to find their place in the world and their experimental ways helped them carve out their own one-of-a-kind musical realm, too. At times, it's been a turbulent place to spend time in, but on Not A Dream But A Controlled Explosion the dust has settled, as Iceboy Violet folds in sounds from contemporary club music to make their most well-rounded and direct work to date.
Tracklist01. Not A Dream (Intro)
02. Street Dogs Have Wings
03. Black Gold feat. Florence Sinclair
04. Wounded Coogi
05. Refracted feat. Orlandor
06. Ekklipse
07. Paris, Bradford
08. Pablos Cathedral