What happens when you put two extremely prolific artists together for a collaboration track? Gee Slab and Namir Blade aim to find out with the release of the single “Hand Grenades,” now streaming everywhere.

For those not paying attention; Gee Slab’s been keeping busy recently with the release of his Because I Can EP, a Negro Justice collab EP entitled Resplendent, a short film for “Triple Beam,” and episodes of his KeepItGee video series… all while continuing to feature on plenty of other artists tracks. Namir Blade has been busy with the release of his highly acclaimed Aphelion’s Traveling Circus, a collab album with L’Orange entitled Imaginary Everything, blowing minds at Acme Feed and Seed, producing tracks for a large number of artists and featuring his verses on additional collabs. It’s safe to say those overviews are incomplete.

Slab’s cadence and wry delivery shines on each of his tracks, while Blade drops clever references through a high-speed, sometimes sing-song, delivery. A Venn Diagram of the two would certainly overlap but, stylistically, they each contain their own unique flair. On “Hand Grenades,” the two fuse these approaches into something uniquely fresh. Slab delivers plenty of personal-but-coy turn-of-phrase with Blade’s choral contributions steering the track in a new direction. The dreamy production and increasingly emphatic delivery on the verses eventually give way to a deep space experience, floating the listener away on a total high. Fusing highly personal lyrics while still being able to inject a dreamy pop hook is not an easy feat to pull off. If it sounds too good to be true, give it a listen; you’ll find it to be accurate and extremely enjoyable.

For now, it’s a one-off collab track between the two but the results are wildly successful. Both MC’s were already worthy of keeping up with, now we can all collectively hope they find themselves together again.

Ross McReynolds and Juan Solorzano are possibly not names you are familiar with but have contributed to recordings you have likely encountered. Both musicians are multi-instrumentalists that lend their input to a number of recordings – McReynolds most recently appeared with Lydia Luce and Jess Nolan while Solorzano plays with Molly Parden and Becca Mancari. Scouring their Instagram’s, there’s countless examples of recordings and performances they’ve been a part of; they get around in the good way.

Powerful players of their ilk often don’t get quite as much time to shine with their own material. Fortunately, these two came together to create a full-length album of original compositions simply entitled Instrumentals. The eleven song undertaking manages to weave its way through a number of different styles, embracing both soothingly ambient tones and more upbeat and engaging compositions. Solorzano had this to say of the creation of the record:

If I was ever to make a “guitar” record, this is probably it. I hadn’t been able to write a “song” song in a while. Between being at loss with the state of the world and struggling with my mental health, I couldn’t find a single fucking thing to say. So instrumentals, it is. I hope that it can be of some solace and healing for someone, just as making this with Ross was for me.

The notion that the record was created as an outlet during the stress of the pandemic and resulted in a calming undertaking is a story we’ve heard before with the Rich Ruth series of ambient EP’s – Where There’s Life – released during the height of quarantine for much the same reasoning. However, this collaborative album results in a much different record from Ruth’s (not that anyone is comparing). These songs honestly do emit a feeling of escape and optimism. “Where Have You Been” lies at the mid-point of the album and serves as the prime example of how these two can craft a song that feels like you’re emerging from a darker place.

It’s unclear if this is a one off record or a sign of future collaborations between the two but that’s immaterial, Instrumentals captures a feeling of a place in time and manages to express itself as a timeless journey of overcoming those hardships. Granted, it’s an instrumental album so you may not glean that feeling from it without the context of why it was made but knowing that the record served as a light through the dark only adds to the level of appreciation we have for it.

Volunteer Department has a deep back catalog of works stretching to at least 2017. The recent singles “Robert Downey, Jr.” and “Shitten” seem to denote a new era for the project. These tracks are clearly related to the prior releases but they contain a tighter production, a clear confidence in their lyrical delivery and some rather intriguing new musical choices.

The brand new single “Cows of Tomorrow” contributes to this new era; embracing a gruff and honest dissatisfaction with the modern world. In speaking with primary songwriter and vocalist Oliver Hopkins about the track, he shared some wonderful insights about the impetus behind the lyrics:

I hope the lyrics add up to form a cautionary tale for those who might too quickly compromise themselves for the sake of adulation, however minor. Getting upvoted on social media blows and is kind of a zero sum game. Achieving recognition for an accomplishment is all well and good but a craven, almost dogged pursuit of “positive reinforcement” from strangers or friends on the internet is no good. Harmful stuff.

Hopkins lyrics are not only accurate but prescient, as the social media platforms themselves are hiding upvoting as a means of social relief. “Harmful stuff” indeed.

The contributions of vocals from Heaven Honey (Jordan Victoria) add another level of darkness to the song, acting as a reminder of how extra harmful validation and feedback towards women can be online. That’s not to say that Internet harm is only binary towards men or women but Victoria’s vocals serve as a reminder that it’s an all inclusive harm.

All told, that sounds like a pretty bleak writeup for a song but, quite frankly, it’s a delight to listen to. The heavy lyrical subject matter is worthy of discussion but the simmering heat of the song itself has an undeniable allure. The vocals interplay with a myriad of well woven instrumentation that begs for repetition to unpeel a new layer on each listen.

Clearly, Volunteer Department doesn’t care what kind of numbers lie beyond the release of the song. That’s a healthy mindset but we suggest putting this one into regular rotation.