James Blake - Assume Form

I'm a little alarmed that it's already been eight years since James Blake released his debut, self-titled album. The post-dubstep comedown and intermingling with ambience and experimental electronics was a confusing time for music and myself as a listener: at first I recoiled and rejected the album harshly, and I've been slow to embrace it since. His second, 2013's Overgrown, was a masterpiece. In 2016, The Colour in Anything wasn't much worse, and now a fourth effort is upon us, he's producing for the likes of Frank Ocean, Kendrick Lamar, and...oh, Beyoncé. It shouldn't come as a shock, then, that certain publications have turned on Blake and started throwing infantile insults about his now-quite-imitable style.


Perhaps it's more personal, though: his partner, actress Jameela Jamil, is famous on Twitter for tackling subjects such as body dysmorphia, racism and feminism, and if there's anything the media loves it's throwing dung at celebrities with a conscience. Perhaps I'm reading too much into things: Assume Form still has largely rave reviews and will most likely be on everyone's end-of-year lists. But I feel there is a poetry somewhere between me panning his beloved debut and now defending him from some reception to his fourth. This is not an opening I am enjoying pulling out of my ass so I'm just going to delve right in.

 

The likes of Travis Scott, André 3000 and ROSALÍA pop up here and it's hard not to notice a more commercial, unchallenging sound - opener 'Assume Form' is a gorgeous piano riff that fittingly boasts "I will be touchable, I will be reachable" in a dedicated, romantic stance ("I will just fall and be beneath her"). Two tracks featuring producer Metro Boomin - behind the likes of Future's Mask Off and Post Malone's Congratulations - follow and they're a fascinating blend of Blake's signature and Travis Scott's current dominance. Blake indeed contributed to Scott's own ASTROWORLD highlight Stop Trying to be God. Of the two, 'Tell Them' is only slightly preferable to 'Mile High' but both prove enjoyable explorations of Blake's production talents. On 'Into the Red' there's an endearing gratitude to Jamil for her commitment to their relationship, and partnered with what sounds like an electronic harp it's a layered, otherworldly love song.


ROSALÍA's El Mal Querer was a huge highlight of last year and she lends her inimitable voice to 'Barefoot in the Park', an utterly beguiling and captivating track that sits somewhere between eerie and adoring. That strange, ebbing production continues onto 'Can't Believe the Way We Flow', a sample of the Manhattans' It Feels So Good to be Loved so Bad and it's Blake's most straightforward love song to date; an infectious, serene hook that might as well conjure the Cupid animations you'd see whenever Bugs Bunny saw Lola. 'Are You in Love?', too, keeps this infectious streak going but finds Blake fretting "this could easily slide... into borrowed time", just to counter the album's declaration to be himself and stop over-analysing.


André 3000 unleashes a godlike verse on 'Where's the Catch?', a continuation on Blake's paranoia that his relationship is too good to be true; "A garden snake won't bite me, but frightens me like I know I'm ate. I know I ain't - I know it" seems a canny description for both of their fears. The solution, for Blake, seems simple: on 'I'll Come Too' he makes countless verbal contracts and promises to do whatever he can for his lover. Some of them are charmingly mundane: on 'Power On' he can't wait to "go home and talk shit about everyone" and on 'Lullaby for my Insomniac' he offers to stay awake and "rather see everything as a blur tomorrow" than let her suffer it alone. I couldn't not mention early single 'Don't Miss It', either - arguably the album's most haunting production and the driving force behind Blake's intentions: "When you stop being a ghost in a shell, and everybody keeps saying you look well - don't miss it".

As a complete record, Blake sets out to do what he intended. The mission statement of trying to drop all pretenses and accept himself for what he is is perhaps at odds with those who want to embrace Blake as this experimental god that's going to continually challenge himself and the listener, but that would be taking things rather literally. There's enough minor details and intriguing prospects on Assume Form to keep people second-guessing and rediscovering for - well, at least until his fifth album, and the overwhelming sense of solace and happiness about the record just confuses me further regarding that whole pithy "sad boy" review. Assume Form is anything but: it's pensive but a celebration more than anything.

Rating: 9/10
Highlights: Where's the Catch?, Barefoot in the Park, Don't Miss It, Tell Them, Assume Form, Power On
Avoid: n/a

Artwork Watch: Is that a velvet shirt? I want a velvet shirt now.  
For fans of: Endearing tribute albums, surprise guest features, the sort of music used in artistic short movies
Coming next: D∆WN