It’s ironic that Santi “Santigold” White is making a comeback just as Taylor Swift has scooped the Grammy for ‘Album Of The Year’ with 1989. Indeed, 99c, White’s third album, delayed from January, quarries the same ’80s nostalgia. But where Taylor’s retro wave is a bit Pat Benatar, White is indebted to the edgier Lene Lovich, Siouxsie Sioux and Bananarama (before they discovered hi-NRG disco).
Taylor’s production is car-wash clean, yet White’s is covered in street-grime. And White articulates a more strident feminism, 99c exploring the theme of branding – the way our lives and selves are packaged for consumption in a hyper-capitalist, digital, fame-fixated world. On the buoyant Insty anthem Can’t Get Enough Of Myself, the lead single featuring BC, White sings facetiously, “If I wasn’t me, I can be sure I’d want to be/I’m pretty major/And I’ll say it out loud.” 99c is often deceptively cheerful – it’s a dualistic album.
Conceptually, it’s somewhere between PJ Harvey and Andy Warhol. For the cover, White commissioned photographer Haruhiko Kawaguchi to snap her vacuum-sealed with a bunch of ‘stuff’. Still, it wouldn’t be so incongruous to playlist Santigold and Tay Tay together. Notably, White has moonlighted as a songwriter for the likes of Ashlee Simpson.
White originally fronted the Philly ska-punk band Stiffed, bonding with future cohort John Hill. But, early on, the sometime A&R rep also wrote for the alt ‘n’ B Res. Arriving soon after that other hybridist MIA, White, then called Santigold, established herself with 2008’s solo debut Santogold. She fell in with Jay Z’s Roc Nation fold. However, since her last outing, Master Of My Make-Believe, four years ago, she’s largely slipped off the radar. Now based in Brooklyn, White had a son with Canadian snowboarder/muso Trevor Andrew. In the interim, ‘Santigold’ became, if not the name of a de facto genre, then a default descriptor for reviewers. Though exactly what the ‘Santigold’ sound is, it’s hard to say.
Credibly, White has avoided the temptation to stash 99c with shiny guests – the biggest of the two here, Drake affiliate ILOVEMAKONNEN, sing-rapping on the breezy Who Be Lovin Me (unexpectedly helmed by Canadian EDM-types Zeds Dead). But she has again worked with an array of producers – old (Hill, TV On The Radio’s Dave Sitek) and new (the divergent Hit-Boy and former Vampire Weekend member Rostam Batmanglij). Missing are those rebel allies Diplo and Switch.
White’s music has always been broadly ‘alt’, with flecks of dancehall, hip-hop, grime and electro. But the material on 99c is more streamlined than that circa Creator or LES Artistes. The best songs are bouncy – Can’t… is club tropicana co-produced by Sweden’s Patrik Berger (Robyn, Icona Pop) that recalls the punky ska girl pop of, not only Bananarama, but also The Belle Stars (YouTube ’em!). Even catchier is the calypso Banshee, plausibly titled after Siouxsie’s iconic group. It has steel pan. Most ‘synth-pop’ is Rendezvous Girl. White’s dancehall affinities remain strong. Big Boss Big Time Business, with Hit-Boy’s input, is trap, Major Lazer-stylee – Rihanna could have easily recorded it for ANTI.
Nonetheless, White’s many darker, broodier and ambivalent numbers weigh down the second half of 99c – the first, the dubtronica Chasing Shadows, coming almost midway, followed too closely by Walking In A Circle. 99c descends into private label trip-hop – imagine Lykke Li singing over UNKLE outtakes. Outside The War especially drags. And Santigold should be anything but generic.
’99c’ is out Februrary 26th, you can grab a copy here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi171sZUQUA
