- bbymutha pivots towards UK club music without losing her distinct Southern rap charm and bite.
- Up until now, Bbymutha has done it all on her own. Self-release after self-release, she's demonstrated herself as a steadfast voice in the American South's underground music scene. She reflects on her life with tongue-in-cheek humour and quick-witted rhymes—equal parts wisdom and warning—in a distinct Chattanooga rasp. She's just as comfortable rapping about serious matters such as poverty, deceitful lovers, single-motherhood and body image as she is discussing courtship and making money. Her lyricism, along with show-stopping sync placements and Overmono's "Cold Blooded" sample of her 2018 "Sleeping With the Enemy," has won her a diverse, dedicated fan base across scenes and genres.
She's built this following this while contending with the woes of outdated patriarchal and misogynistic viewpoints still present within rap, plus Bible belt perspectives on gender and sexuality—all while raising two sets of twins and being plagued by sleep paralysis, a condition she's battled since childhood. On her UK tour, she was introduced to local club scenes. Her second album, sleep paralysis, was produced in a London recording studio, where she married across-the-pond sounds with her Southern sensibilities for her most club-ready project yet.
For staunch fans—lovingly dubbed bastards—this album is the culmination of her long-time dance floor teasing. The album's lead single "gun kontrol" nods to these familiar sounds, condensing her usual intro and outro skits into a brusque opener of frenzied screams, tire screeches and a tripled kick that rings off like ammunition rounds. On cue, bbymutha's assertive voice reminds us, "I do whatever want."
There's a treasure trove of hyperkinetic UK-inflected beats on sleep paralysis, but they always bend to bbymutha's will. She follows suit with a cheeky hook, "He ain't give me what I want / he must be broken / gave him back," on the fastest track "piss!" The song is punctuated by fat low-end whomps and skittering breakbeats—a combo that would flourish on larger systems. On "tony hawk" she stunts on her detractors ("Still a skater / See you later / Tony Hawkin' on my haters"), comparing herself to the premier American skateboarder on a nostalgic breakbeat with a Notting Hill flair. "lines" touches on distorted post-punk, while "final girl"—an allusion to the last woman standing in horror movies—closes in with the assailing swing of grime.
While UK-influenced sounds roam about, so does bbymutha's Southern drawl and distinctive wisecracking. She has a masterful command of lyrical tempo, drawing out her shit talking on "rich" and referencing her new home of Atlanta—"I don't like these niggas I just play along / pop out in Atlanta / suck me up I call him Georgia dome / If you need your nigga better keep him home." The following BPM surge ups the ante of smack talk. On "nice/nasty," the album's slowest track at 75 BPM—she proudly proclaims to be a "country motherfucker / Tennessee not Alabama" over a glossy trap beat replete with references to Southern hitmakers like Migos, Future and Lil Wayne.
She ends just as brashly as she began with the closing track "mutha massacre." The layered cackles, yowling shrills and heaving 808s recall the languid Dirty South diss tracks of Three 6 Mafia—or slasher tropes of ambling killers in confident pursuit of scampering targets. It's a fitting conclusion to a project engulfed in whimsical terror, as bbymutha displays a firm sense of self, even in the face of uncharted sonic territory.
Tracklist01. gun kontrol
02. piss!
03. head x shoulders
04. rich
05. tony hawk
06. lines
07. nice/nasty
08. ghostface
09. final girl
10. mutha massacre
11. go!