“The album went to 18, but they know I’m number one,” says Bobby Vylan on Humble As The Sun’s opening title track, one of a couple of references to the commercial performance of the duo’s previous release The Price Of Life. They’ve got every reason to laud the achievement, too—an independent alternative album hitting the Top 20 is nothing to scoff at in itself, but to also reach that level entirely self-released, produced, recorded and mixed, for the first time ever, hits a new stratum of accomplishment.
‘Humble as the sun’ is about right, then. On one hand, you’ve got the source of all life on Earth; on the other, you’ve got Bob Vylan blazing a trail in such celebratory fashion. It does feel warranted, not only as a self-acknowledgment of Black excellence and achievement that many will look to stifle, but also simply because there’s no act quite like Bob Vylan in recent memory. In the world of genre-bending, socially vital alternative music, Bob Vylan are country miles ahead of the rest, by a rather objective margin. Putting aside an alt-rap-punk meld that legitimately has more bite than many similar would even strive for, the presence of Bob Vylan in UK music is so close to being entirely unignorable, in borderline unprecedented fashion.
So, yeah, there’s every right to be ‘humble as the sun’. Don’t take that as a sign of laurel-resting, though; that’s not how Bob Vylan do things. Sure, they’re more empowered by their newly acquired status, but a country around them that’s still mired in austerity and institutional inequality won’t wait for their victory lap to be over. If anything, they feel hungrier for it, now in a position of strength that carries an already strident, opinionated voice even further. ‘Toning back’ or—god forbid—‘selling out’ is so far out of the purview of Bob Vylan, it’s not even funny, and Humble As The Sun delivers the brunt of that message loud and clear.
It’s where Bob Vylan’s power comes from, ultimately, and why it might all seem more radical compared to others ploughing a similar furrow. There’s the inherent bit of extra punch that comes from primarily being based in hip-hop, but the outspokenness of it all will do more than anything else. When the majority of acts in the public eye supposedly rallying for change or standing against a corrupt system are so milquetoast, being opinionated and unfiltered like this might seem shocking or ‘controversial’. It’s not, in reality; it’s just truth and experience. Frontman Bobby Vylan’s is one of the isolated Black voices that this scene has, and thus will speak more candidly on racism and discrimination and distrust of police, government and the powers that be. “Fuck queen and country,” he gnashes on Reign, unpatriotic and anti-monarchy like few will outright extol. After all, what reason is there to ‘love your country’ when the target is immovably on your back for those in power, and has been for generations?
Radicalisation to prove those oppressive systems wrong feels like a motivating factor, either through uplifting the communities ground under the same boot like on Dream Big, or dismantling what currently exists by any means necessary. There’s a mindset of fighting back through necessity, especially on a track like Makes Me Violent that speaks on liberal concepts of ‘peaceful change’ with almost mocking derision. Operating through strict nonviolence is a privilege that simply isn’t open to everyone, with Bob Vylan serving as the stalwart leaders of that route. It’s the purest form of punk, in a way—mobilised, driving activism on a purely grassroots level.
It helps that, on top of all that, Humble As The Sun is just an extremely listenable album. If The Price Of Life was sometimes overwhelmed by its sprawl, there’s a consolidated focus to this follow-up that’s no less diverse in tone. As ever, the clearer hip-hop tracks do the most, as Reign and Right Here come anchored by Bobbie Vylan’s razor-tight drumwork for the pace and force his similarly-named compatriot needs to spit over. By comparison, the low-slung rock guitars and more drawn-out hooks of Get Yourself A Gun and Makes Me Violent are less thrilling. Not bad by any means, but when Bob Vylan can display such a quickness of thought and hand, there’s a drizzled-out feel that’s not exactly up to the same par. That said, they do serve as components for some of the more seamless genre-splicing this scene has to offer. Likely a benefit of hip-hop having the open space by design to try new things (see the Fatboy Slim sample running throughout Right Here), there’s never a turn on Humble As The Sun that’s outright uncomfortable or feels weirdly placed. That in itself can rocket this album past plenty of its contemporaries.
Of course, a frontman like Bobby Vylan will also do that, in no uncertain terms. The fire-spitting aspect is a given, but it’d be nothing without the truckloads of charisma at his disposal, often skirting (or sometimes crossing) the line of barrel-chested bravado and outright ego. He makes that work, though, and the fact there’s a personality this outsized in this space is a win in itself, regardless of the specifics. Hunger Games brings forward an incredulous humour from its own barbed commentary, exacerbated even further on He’s A Man and its express intent of making every lyric a wham punchline. There’s some great dexterity in flow and wordplay, needed for a de facto tag of ‘rap-rock’ to carry the legitimacy that Bob Vylan clearly want and need.
You can’t say it isn’t a success, though. Not only is Humble As The Sun a great example of the creative variety and vitality of this scene, but it’s a step up for Bob Vylan themselves. It’s intent crystallised, now with ever sharper edges and more slack on the leash to spread them out. In fact, there probably isn’t a leash there at all; it likely snapped a long time ago, seeing as Bob Vylan are left to their own devices to cut a swathe through what it means to be an impactful act with eyes firmly on them. ‘Changing the game’ is one of those horrible journalistic aphorisms that loses more meaning with every use, but it’s hard to think of what else is suitable to qualify Bob Vylan. They’re in a field of one in terms of how their particular waves are being made, and that doesn’t look to be changing any time soon. If anything, the gulf between them and a whole host of industry machinations lagging behind is only getting wider. If there’s a more valid reason to be ‘humble as the sun’, no one’s shown it off quite like this.
For fans of: Lambrini Girls, SNAYX, Enola Gay
‘Humble As The Sun’ by Bob Vylan is out now on Ghost Theatre Records.
Words by Luke Nuttall
