Death Grips have received a lot of praise and a lot of hate in the last year and a half, after releasing their landmark album The Money Store in 2012 they went on to cancel a full tour, release the next album for free (which ended their relationship with Epic) and then cancelling another tour, as well as not showing up to a show in Chicago... but what about the music? Well, it's no less chaotic and agressive than their recent approach to label and tour obligations.
While their previous three albums featured MC Ride prominently, Government Plates (which was released for free and to the complete surprise of their fans) is much more experimental, spacey and electronic. Only a few songs feature Ride regularly, while most are majorly instrumental or feature just a few lines or samples that give personality to the wall of noise and electronic beats behind.
Government Plates is a short, agressive and psychedelic journey that feels like listening to rap on a variety of drugs.
From the short, fast paced, electronic bubbling track "Big House" to the crawling glitch-hop of "I'm Overflow" and finally the impressive wall-of-noise behemoth "Whatever I Want (Fuck Who's Watching)" the album has a lot of variety to offer in it's 35 minutes. From Ride's in-your-face-verbal-abuse shouting/rapping, to Zach Hill's frenetic beats to Andy Morin's electronic sweeps and heavy synth riffs the album has it's own personality and shows a new "progressive" face of the californian band.
There's no doubt Death Grips have a lot of personality both in the studio and outside of it, and they still have a lot to offer musically.
8.5/10
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