Sault - NINE Review
On NINE, SAULT come back grimier and more focused than before, without losing much of the infectious rhythm of their previous projects.
Last year, in the wake of the widespread BLM movement, SAULT released two powerful albums discussing elements of the black experience, from microaggressions, to fake-woke white people, to the reality of police brutality, all accompanied with some funky flavour and danceable grooves. While maintaining a fair degree of anonymity, or at least mystery, they managed to hold Rough Trade’s album of the year with Untitled (Rise), and top the end of year lists for BBC 6 Music and NPR with Untitled (Black Is). On NINE, available for only ninety-nine days from its release, SAULT come back grimier and more focused than before, without losing much of the infectious rhythm of their previous projects. A concept album dealing with gang violence in London, NINE is informative and moving while still something that can get you moving.
‘London Gangs’, the first full length track on the project, is about as grimy and abrasive as SAULT have got up to this point, with a distorted bass driving the sound of this track. It’s in your face, with a real attitude to it, with lyrics that depict the reality of growing up around gang violence, unpicking both the internal struggle of being stuck in a system of violence and aggression which is “built on lies” and the distrust in the police who are charged with tackling the issue. ‘Trap Life’ brings a bit more groove to the mix while continuing these themes, with lyrics such as “please don’t reach for that nine, nine, nine” while also yearning for freedom from the cycle of violence.
‘Fear’, however, I have mixed feelings about. While it does shed a light on the emotional effects of gang violence, it feels a little unfinished and repetitive, like it could have been a riff from which to start a track rather than a finished product. If this were the only part of the album making this point, then I would possibly be more likely to give it the benefit of the doubt, but the snippets placed throughout the record make this point in a much more human way, and a way which gives considerably more depth and understanding. If we take ‘Mike’s Story’, for example, we hear about the murder of Michael Ofo’s father; at the end of ‘9’, we hear about how crews came from just people being grouped by where they were from, but then violence and beef is just thrown on you; as the album closes, we hear a snippet about the anxiety felt going to school without knowing “what the temperature was”. Each of these parts is a reminder that, while BLM opponents may point to “black-on-black crime” as a way of diminishing racial violence, the victims are still people of colour, and the trauma runs deep.
While the first half of the album feels cathartic in tone, the second half is softer for the most part. ‘Bitter Streets’, with its fairly classical neo-soul sound, has a much more obvious beauty to it, but the tone is still quite sombre. The instrumental is jazzy and chilled-out, but the lyrics are still dealing with this difficult issue, seeming to be from the perspective of someone whose loved one has got wrapped up in gang violence. This tone and sound continue on the stripped-back ‘Alcohol’, which is pretty but awfully repetitive, the lyrics “Oh alcohol, look what I’ve done” repeated for the majority of the track. While SAULT make reference to alcohol issues in an Instagram post stating that many “who fail to heal from childhood traumas turn to alcohol & drugs as medicine”, this track seems to fail to grasp much depth on the issue — though it could be interpreted as an internal cycle of shame.
‘You From London’ stood out to me on the track list for its Little Simz feature and she once again lives up to expectations, delivering a smooth, melodic flow, though it is slightly hindered by the pitch-shifting. The production, with the “are you from London?” sample, is quite playful, as the track juxtaposes the reality of life in council estates in London with the stereotypes of London from a caricatured Californian, with the images of royalty and people “going round on horses”.
As the album closes out, we are given two of the softest, most stripped-back tracks, in ‘9’ and ‘Light’s in Your Hands’. ‘9’ features this album’s prettiest vocal performance; there’s a gentle, dreamy neo-soul aesthetic to the track, but still with a rather danceable rhythm. ‘Light’s in Your Hands’ is similar to ‘Alcohol’ in its slow, sombre style, as it tells the story of someone whose seemingly loveless childhood led them to looking for leadership in a gang. While lyrically powerful, it’s a shame the recording is of lower quality, sounding rather tinny.
Such a focused project as this is rare, with ‘9’ really exploring almost every aspect of gang violence on this album, from anxiety to substance abuse, to distrust in police. While previous SAULT albums could be argued to contain some filler, at just 10 tracks and just over half an hour in runtime, that can hardly be said here. There are definitely a couple of tracks that felt a little unfinished, either in the writing or the mixing, but for the most part this album manages to find an impressive balance between being informative and being enjoyable to listen to, creating an impactful final product.
