Bella Blair – Gimmie A Light – Review

June 11, 2020

Bella Blair: Gimmie A Light Single Review – Steve Topple for Pauzeradio.com.

Bella Blair is back. After last year’s final cut, the haunting Save Me From Myself, one of the most exciting female artists to emerge from Jamaica recently has returned with a new track – taking on Ludwig van Beethoven, nonetheless.

Gimmie A Light, released via Frankie Music Production and VPAL Music, sees Bella Blair team up with the always on-point Frankie Music. He’s an eclectic producer, and him and her give themselves free rein across the cut to demonstrate this.

The obvious stand-out point of the track is that it samples the opening rondo of Beethoven’s Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor; more commonly known as Für Elise. It’s a highly smart move by Blair and Frankie, because not only does it demonstrate the versatility of both Beethoven’s and their compositions, it also gives the track an instantly recognisable hook for many people.

But aside from that, Gimmie A Light is a masterclass in Trap/Reggae/Toronto RnB 2020 hybrid music; for all intents and purposes straight out of the Revival scene.

Gimmie A Light opens with an astral-like Toronto RnB arrangement, fitting of the title. Synth keys, high-passed and heavily reverbed run a chromatic riff. The bass takes the track straight into Trap realms, with its slightly distorted, super-sub feel. It’s full-on lo-fi, saturated and compressed to give it that expansive timbre – but the rhythm is stripped back, just hitting the first beat of each bar on a semibreve. A scratch synth hits beat three, complimenting the bass. But then, an otherworldly theremin appears, performing a haunting refrain and heavily nodding to the Revival movement. And Gimmie A Light begins proper.

It’s ostensibly Reggae on the face of it. The keys tread a bubble rhythm; the bass reverts to something more syncopated and Rocksteady and the drums appear to start a one drop, with the hi-hats on a double time rhythm. But the latter are not all that they seem, because littered throughout are Trap buzz rolls, making for a far edgier feel than a standard Reggae rhythm. Also, the kick doesn’t skip the one but hits it directly, and then at times the final off of the bar as well. Meanwhile the snare hits beat three – and the whole drum arrangement is utterly ambiguous, with the busyness of Reggae but the unnerving devices of Trap. Very smart.

Across Gimmie A Light, the use of reverb, peaking and troughing decay and passing is prominent, once more bringing in Toronto RnB production values – along with a hazy, smoke-filled bridge. The sparse yet pointed inclusion of funky, bending electric guitars just adds to this and the whole thing is an expertly constructed foray into multiple genres. And the end, with a washboard and bongos, is just glorious.

Bella Blair is, of course, superb throughout. She has a delicious ability to maximise the potential of her unique voice at every opportunity; here being the perfect example. She effortlessly glides around on a sultry yet gleamingly clear soprano, imitating Beethoven’s rondo with a clever use of dynamics: pushing the volume on the higher register notes, then paring it back as the pitch drops. Blair also does a rapid-fire, well-tuned and rhythmically intricate singjay. What makes her stand out is her enunciation, with no words dropped or incomprehensible. Further to that, at the start of the song her words are more clipped and rhythmically shorter, before they’re elongated as the track progresses; a delicious piece of musical anthropomorphism about the subject matter’s effects.

But there’s a distinct social point made by Blair and Frankie with Gimmie A Light. The smoking of weed by women is still viewed by some as not ‘right’, or a preserve of the men. So, along with other female artists, Blair is breaking down entrenched stereotypes and patriarchal rules; what so many women in Roots-derived music are doing so well, generally.

Gimmie A Light is a very welcome return from Blair. On-point, on trend and on-message – her and Frankie have created a strong example of Revival-driven Reggae with a delicious smattering of Trap thrown in. When’s the full album dropping, please?