Album of the Week: slowthai - UGLY

It’s almost hard to believe slowthai’s debut album came out in May of 2019, having come out in the last 6 months before shit hit the fan in 2020, as it feels like Nothing Great About Britain put the British artist on the map a lot more than just four years ago, such has been his rise to prominence and subsequent influence.

Going on to release his sophomore album Tyron in 2021, which would subsequently hit number 1 in the charts, slowthai levelled up and raised expectations for what was to come next even higher… which he has more than lived up to on his emotional, diverse, relentless and downright dope third album, UGLY.

His most complete album to date, both evident on first listen as well as by his own admission, slowthai spoke about his three albums to date so far saying “The first album was the sound of where I’m from and everything I thought I knew. he second album is what was relevant to me at that moment in time, the present. And this album is completely me — about how I feel and what I want to be… it’s everything I’ve been leading up to.”

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The most cohesive amalgamation of his sound so far, what slowthai was leading up to was an uncompromising, style-fusing record of 12 tracks that twist and turn through all manner of post-punk, indie-rock, Britpop, hip hop and grime influences.

If this is everything slowthai has been leading up to… we can only imagine what to expect from album number four, with UGLY sure to be around when it comes to year end best of lists for 2023.