It is easy to talk about music in terms of genres and styles, but sometimes it makes more sense to explain them through less tangible ideas, such as outlooks and attitudes. After all, styles change, and things like genres aren’t very useful tools in the more exploratory, more expansive world music is made in today.
“Jerp” is a blend of the emotive and the explosive, blending deft electronic grooves with lush, liquid sonics. And with this understated creativity found at the heart of the song, its dynamic is driven by the lyrics, Brown moving from the insular to the irate, working through his innermost concerns and then firing off salvos of unbridled anger to create the sonic intensity and infectiousness.
It’s the sound of the punk spirit kicking its way into modern creativity. If the music here is made at the cutting edge of today’s digital sound, the lyrics are nothing less than that furious, frustrated, timeless cry of youth at odds with the world, or at least with the relationship they thought was their whole world.
The punk spirit never dies, how could it? It existed long before the spiky-haired legions strapped on low-slung guitars and wrote anthems for their fellow doomed youths. “Jerp” is the perfect example of that attitude, with barely concealed anger weaving through a more modern landscape and coming to a head in the most creative way.
After all, more great songs have been written out of a sense of despair and disenfranchisement than from a position of comfort and contentment. And this is just such a song.
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