9 Oct 2018

The Sampler: Room 25 by Noname

From The Sampler, 7:30 pm on 9 October 2018

Nick Bollinger appreciates the verbal virtuosity of Chicago rapper Noname.

Noname

Noname Photo: supplied

Room 25 is the second album by 26-year-old Chicago-born rapper Faitmah Warner who performs as Noname. 

While she isn’t as anonymous as her alias might imply, she does operate outside traditional channels. Though she has approaches from major labels, Room 25 – like her earlier album Telefone – is currently available solely on Bandcamp as an indie release at a name-your-own price - a deliberate strategy to retain her independence. And you’ll find as much independent thought and freshness of expression in these tracks.

Room 25

Room 25 Photo: supplied

Having started out at school with an interest in slam poetry, Warner’s rapping could be already be heard five years ago on fellow-Chicagoan Chance The Rapper’s Acid Rap mixtape. There was also a cameo on his celebrated 2016 Colouring Book album, but more significant was the release of her own first album that same year. Telefone stood out for its quiet complexity, and the new record takes those strengths and multiplies them. But she also harks back to Telefone in ‘Don’t Forget About’ when she addresses the reality of having made a record that, as one emailer tells her, ‘saves lives’, while continuing to wrestle with one’s own day-to-day demons, whether its poverty or loneliness.

Another side of Noname’s creative, kaleidoscopic lyrical style is found in ‘Blaxploitation’, where she riffs off samples from classic Blaxploitation flicks to conclude that the real America is still a movie that’s ‘coming soon’, while in ‘Prayer Song’ she takes a unique angle on Black Lives Matter by rapping from the point of view of a white cop.

I hear echoes of D’Angelo’s elastic funk in the rhythm, which is topped off with orchestral strings, used sparingly but beautifully throughout the album. Like D’Angelo, she favours a live band, a rarity in current hip-hop. The band here is a sophisticated jazzy outfit led by Chicago bass player/producer Phoelix, who matches Noname’s verses with arrangements that are impressionistic yet always find a groove.

Noname has a personal, conversational delivery and knows how to use the mic to bring us in close, where she barely needs to do more than whisper, while Phoelix and company complement her with their delicate restraint.

Noname has said she is conscious that some are eager to cast her as the ‘anti-Cardi B’, and it’s true there couldn’t be more contrast between her and the brash hyper-sexual all-platforms celebrity. There is a political, historical and literary depth to Room 25 that you won’t find in ‘Bodak Yellow’, for all its charms.  Yet cerebral as Noname is, she doesn’t deny herself a few celebrations of the sensual as well, and among other things there’s more sexual imagery on this latest album. Even there, though, she’s inventive and unorthodox. If you’re looking for a hip-hop album that defies expectations, Noname’s Room 25 does that in just about every way I can think of.