LEMFRECK

Blood, Sweat & Fears (Noctown)

For a debut album which technically isn’t – roughly half of Blood, Sweat & Fears has been previously released, on two EPs of the same title – Lemfreck, a Newport rapper/producer, has found a way to make this 15-track opus hang together with an almost cinematic pacing. There are some guest features within: grime elder Manga Saint Hillaire appears on Death By Nyash, and Hackney’s MacOsare enlivens album highpoint Red Hot, but Lemfreck can handle things fine on his own, with an offhand, near-mutter MC style that can convey deep thought and lurking menace.

Blood… is far from a party album: light relief, such as it is, comes in the form of neo-soul-adjacent heart-rending (Sad Boys Club, which is precisely as its title implies), and when tracks are more beat-forward there’s still an intangible overcast south Walian gloom to proceedings, even with the deep house-y synth line employed on See Me Now. No doubt it’d take on a life of its own live in a sweaty club, though, and would be great if it was an early diary entry in a long and successful career for Lemfreck.

words NOEL GARDNER