That sure is a Next-level video…
[Video][Website]
[7.42]
Crystal Leww: Music is special to me because it’s identifiable and specific, because it attaches itself to vivid and specific memories and moments and settings and encompasses more than just the audio. This song is so perfectly Chicago: one of its rising rap stars on a hot house beat. Mensa’s experience as a rapper is invaluable here as a house vocalist; this is a song that relies entirely on the contours of words, on flow. Already this summer, I’ve listened to “Down On My Luck” on repeat sweating in my apartment through my laptop speakers, walking down the street to my pharmacy, on endless forms of transportation, and even while processing documents at work. I hope I hear this song on every car ride, on every dance floor, on every street corner, on every trip to any department store. I want to listen to this forever. I want it to be summer forever.
[10]
David Turner: There are two songs that immediately come to mind with this track: Kid Cudi’s “Day N Nite (Crookers Remix)” and Wiley’s “Wearing My Rolex” — songs where the rapping is perfunctory to the song’s subject matter, but in reality they are just great dance songs with the structured shifted to accommodate an MC. “Down on My Luck” is the exact same. I first saw this mentioned as an “International Single,” but the way that US pop is seemingly splintering in every which direction in a post-EDM world; don’t let this great song get stuck overseas!
[8]
Will Adams: Incongruous Comparison Alert: The rapid-fire, almost arrhythmic delivery of the verses reminds me of Sheryl Crow’s “All I Wanna Do.” It creates a polyrhythm against the beat, taking “Down On My Luck” from a strong deep house song to something destined to become a summer classic.
[8]
Patrick St. Michel: Considering how well he handled himself rapping over Disclosure, embracing that sound for his own purposes seems like a great idea for Vic Mensa. “Down on My Luck” looks to cash in on the UK garage revival those two bros kicked off, while also highlighting his versatility. He shines, but special credit goes to producer Stefan Ponce, who goes and creates a solid imitation Disclosure track (the way Mensa’s voice gets all fluttery and the beat sort of evaporates away is some great attention to detail) that also is catered directly to Mensa’s delivery.
[7]
Alfred Soto: Polite and modest — too modest. Mensa’s accelerations aren’t charmless but the beat is the sort I heard in late nineties VIP lounge.
[5]
Jer Fairall: Disclosure-lite as far as 2014 house goes, which is to say neither unpleasant nor transporting, but Mensa’s method of allowing the words to tumble out of his mouth with very little regard for meter or stress is the kind of neat trick that he might easily turn into a career. Here, though, it’s more than a gimmick: overwhelmed by the weed, the lights of Hollywood, and the weight of disappointment, he sounds as disoriented as he ought to, and the result is, perverse as it may seem, happily infectious.
[7]
Anthony Easton: Funked out and moves so quickly, but you can hear every word. The speed doesn’t sound frantic, the guttural sighs slow things down a bit, and the orchestral break just adds elegant frills. Pure sex, unbridled, but on Frette sheets.
[7]
Thomas Inskeep: Interesting that Vic Mensa is such a highly-touted young rapper, since this track is basically a straight up Chicago/Detroit house track circa ’89. It’s got that dark LaTour feel via Kevin Saunderson (there’s more than a passing resemblance to Inner City’s “Good Life”) — and that means it’s pretty great. His flow, while obviously faster, reminds me of Kendrick Lamar — also great.
[8]
Scott Mildenhall: Existential syllable synthesis over something, in the main, not far from an Ameritz Tribute To Disclosure. They probably wouldn’t go for the electro touches or gentle rattling, but might well approve in general, especially with the dedication to helping you lose your mind. That it serves as a debut single of sorts and not just some Johnny Producer feature is a little puzzling though.
[6]
Brad Shoup: All that singing, when what he really wants to do is jack. His reversals and koans are Rap Genius catnip; let’s just say the delivery speed’s to his benefit. Everything’s about feel: a unified feel, a pop feel. He’s here to Eurodance.
[7]
Edward Okulicz: I pretty much love every sound in this — Mensa’s ghostly “la la la,” the attention-grabbing drum break, the snatches of stock-standard backing female “uh” noises — and it’s all put together in service of a fine bit of deep house. The stream-of-consciousness rap is quick but still dreamy enough to emulate half-asleep or half-drunk.
[9]
Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.
I know I quoted Whitman last week. But Chicago has a lot of rappers right now, and lot of good ones, and the most off-center one might really be Vic (sorry, Chance; sorry, Katie; not sorry, Lupe), who is less rapper than singer who can rap, so the Sandburg is deserved here. And he grew up in what they call Chiraq, or strive to not call Chiraq, like the rest, but he was an indie band member before drilling hit the mainstream, and here he is suavely sing-rapping a very British song on a smoke-and-synths track ready-made for any club in London. That’s cunning, sure, and strong in a way his contemporaries can’t rival: this is a hit, maybe, or at least the coolest song in rotation on some station across the pond — certainly, it moves like a hit — and if Vic has to move his sound out of his town to put on for it, so be it. Strength isn’t just one thing.
[7]