Hi everyone, Lawnthony Mowtano here, the internet's busiest music nerd, and it's time for a review of this new Genesis Owusu album, Redstar Wu & the Worldwide Scourge.

This is the third full-length album of Australian singer, rapper, songwriter Mr. Genesis Owusu. Since about 2021, this guy has been on my radar, mostly through a connection to another artist from down under who I happen to enjoy a lot of the work of, Mr. Kieran J. Callanan. After catching wind of Mr. Owusu that way, he then made, in my view, what was an underground pandemic-era splash with his debut album Smiling With No Teeth, which was a poetic, conceptual, very ambitious start to his career, an album that creatively and uniquely blended elements of hip-hop, rock, soul, electronic music too, pulling inspiration from all sorts of contemporary places too: Kendrick Lamar, Death Grips.

Now, eventually this record was followed up with a very stark sophomore album, Struggler, in 2023, which went in a much more decidedly post-punk direction, a record that in a lot of ways was very much about the struggle of life and existence itself, physically and spiritually, with a bit of a Kafkaesque twist in its storytelling.

And now, with the world having grown even darker since then by many metrics, you could argue Genesis Owusu has even more material to work with on Redstar Wu. On this record, the much greater dangers the world is are being met with even bolder satire and callouts, especially on lead singles like "Pirate Radio," which has a throbbing synth bassline, a very direct opening spoken-word verse with plenty of poetic nods to some pretty obvious figures and phenomena, be it either deep pools of mass hysteria or toupee'd totalitarians. And things get even more on the nose in verse 2: "Elon's a effin' weirdo / who gave these incels moolah? / Spit out your threats and slurs, kid / I'll show you something crueler." There's even a point where he says Kanye fans are effing up his homeostasis. We're only a few minutes into the record and Genesis is already smacking just about every racist, terminally online hornet's nest he possibly can, and doing it with no remorse.

Also, loving the way these verses contrast with super psychedelic choruses, and some very nice trumpet embellishments out of nowhere on the back end, too. As far as other singles from this record are concerned, I'm also loving "Death Cult Zombie," which has a much punkier quality to it, and guitar and bass work that lands somewhere in between Talking Head's "Psycho Killer" and The Clash's "Should I Stay or Should I Go." And the track is a whole character portrait of white supremacists who have given into a death cult-like mentality out of fear, inadequacy, and inferiority, with one line that stuck out to me being, "Mr. Master Race, but still no GED."

"Stampede" was another blood-pumping teaser to this record, one of a few cuts on it that go in kind of a catchy, but super dark new wave direction with lots of driving grooves and guitars. I also think lyrically this track works as a deceptively simple, but smart read on the current cultural discourse, with groups of people kinda ideologically sloshing left and right, or front and back, depending on where the current's going, or, I dunno, a given need for validation. And it's not a centrist creed by any means, but more of a call to have love and deeper principles informing your ideology, so that you're not just merely being driven by whatever hooky hot takes a particular side might have for you.

And then we have the track "Life Keeps Going," which to me, kind of feels like another Struggler-era piece of post-punk, but with maybe more electronics in its production. I would say this track is giving some Death Grips, No Love Deep Web energy too. We have bellowing lead vocals, chilly vocal harmonies, speedy drum machine beats, riding along a linear progression that's super hypnotic and just kind of continues on into oblivion, like life itself.

Now, believe it or not, this is a pretty lengthy and dense record, and these teasers are really just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to this album's best moments and its overall versatility. Because it's no surprise, given the material he has put out so far, Genesis Owusu continues to really kind of push it on the musical diversity front, as I think there are very few artists out there right now covering this many bases and doing it this well.

Take "Hellstar," for example, which is this slow-mo, psych-funk piece with bits of Sly Stone and Bootsy Collins in equal measure. Some chill rap verses too that flirt with both sensuality and revolution. There's a Duckwrth appearance, a wintry bridge– there's a lot to like here. I also appreciate much of what "Falling Both Ways" brings to the table, between its tense beats and super beefy basslines. And, miraculously, Ladyhawke, who I haven't really thought about in a dog's age, she really does enhance the kinda low-key, sleepy, indie-tronic energy of the track, even if it's not my favorite style.

And I also like what this song kinda does for the narrative of the album, too, because either literally or metaphorically, it seems to bring this idea of, 'what does it matter where we are, what state we're in, how the world is going, so long as we have each other?' There's kind of this love, this oasis of sorts. Again, asking what's really the difference. But the following track answers that question and claims no, there actually, like, is a difference. When you're living in a horrible, dark world, at one point or another it is going to prevent joy, get in the way of freedom.

That being, "The Worldwide Scourge," one of the most depressing things I've heard in my life. I really don't know how else I don't know how else to quantify it. I mean, I will say, sonically, stylistically, I am picking on some, Kendrick Lamar "Blacker the Berry" vibes, with the booming beat, urgent chord progression, grim lyricism, godly, bellowing vocals on the chorus. But beyond that, it's really the content lyrically of the track that makes it truly what it uniquely is.

And that's every nasty, disempowering, demoralizing thing he's seeing day in and day out in real life, on the timeline — divide and conquer propaganda too. It's a very heavy track that is well contrasted with the idea of "Life Keeps Going," with that track. And then following that, "Most Normal American Voter:," whose message also matches up really well with "Death Cult Zombie." Again, really liking the flow, the macro-vision of the tracklist.

But "Most Normal" is this really visceral piece of electropunk, with shouty lead vocals and a super simple but insanely good chorus. "Missing information! Missing information!" In so many ways, the character archetype of this track is embodying the same irrational, conspiracy-brained moron mentality that we heard kind of dissected in so many ways on Viagra Boy's Caveworld. But I think Genesis very much has his own interesting commentary to add to the conversation, too.

Then things get toned down in a very tasteful way on "Situations," which is a slick alternative rock number with some heady verses about, really, how easy it is to get hype and drunk off of hate and anger and division, and to instead very calmly and with clarity embrace understanding. And I know some people in the comments will hate this, but like, the closest point of comparison, at least to me, was like, I don't know, some recent era Red Hot Chili Peppers, but good.

Then we have "For Life," which, despite me liking the sentiment of this track, in some respects it does kind of like read as this idea, this embrace of living life in the moment, or getting what joy out of life you can, even if there are kind of like greater issues facing you.

But I hate the weakly sung vocals and the way the singing is pitched up so many tones to where it's like, in chipmunk territory. It sounds like a bad Brockhampton experiment, and the more I hear it, the more I just get not much out of it. Then, as far as the final leg is concerned, it's a bit mixed. "Runnin Outta Time" is one of those other dark new wave jams I was referring to earlier, where I think Genesis portrays himself in a very real, relatable way, despite these kind of proclamations that he's giving across the album when it comes to his perception or understanding of the current state of things. He also admits that at the end of the day, he's just following his intuition and his gut and his own personal read on things, and that he fears running out of time.

"Big Dog," I really enjoy the message of, in terms of not really getting that much out of seeing people who are powerful or wealthy, that there's no mortal man on this planet who could impress him by those means. In the current age of the music industry and social I do think that is a very kind of essential piece of commentary to hit listeners with, but I'm not too crazy about the dancey electronic synth chords and beats this track has to offer. It feels almost like a bit of a mismatch to me in terms of mood and message. And then the closing track is a bit of a head-scratcher for me too, in terms of the sentiment it leaves things off on. And look, I can very much kind of chalk this up to maybe the inner pessimist in me just being a little bit too loud in reaction to this.

But it does seem to hold on to the idea that so long as we are together and we have each other and there is a sense of unity there, that everything's gonna be completely all right, it'll blow over, there'll be the dawn of a new day. It sounds very serene and blissful in a way that is warm, inviting, and really pleasant. However, part of me thinks that it might require maybe a bit more than that to get things over this hump, as it were. It is one of the more cohesive songs on the record, and I'm not gonna crap on a guy for having some hope for the future. Certainly we're a bit low on that in these times.

But outside of a finish that I think was not quite as strong as the start, and a couple of cuts along the way that I thought were a little underwhelming, Redstar Wu is Genesis Owusu's most ambitious record to date by far in terms of its messaging and all the bases it's trying to cover. And while the climax wasn't quite as hard-hitting as maybe what I was hoping, the ride along the way was still really great. I loved the vast majority of the tracks. Came away still impressed with this man's versatility, with his songwriting, with his voice, both musically and lyrically.

Which is why I'm feeling a light to decent 8 on this album.

Anthony Fantano. Genesis Owusu. Forever.