After years of chasing bliss, greater meaning, and trying too many genres to name, Sulfur Surfer feels like Bladee’s definitive album, writes Tom Cameron
Mapping out Bladee’s career has always been a weird one. His music’s always been hard to sell to sceptics.
He’s been a known figure in online spaces for years, and has always split opinions. Your favourite artist is probably, at the very least, aware of Bladee and his Swedish rap collective, Drain Gang.
Starting out as a teenage auto-crooner, wailing in a monotone voice over entrenching beats, he’s since evolved into an artist that truly can’t be replicated. His aesthetic has proven to work well with whatever genre he sees fit, from gentle art pop to abrasive rage-rap, or even moody alt-rock.
‘Sulfur Surfer’ follows up 2024’s ‘Cold Visions’, his unique take on rage-rap, which seems to be all the rage (pun intended) right now. It was Bladee at his most anguished and agitated. 10 years on from his debut, he still felt tormented and unaccomplished. In spirit, Sulfur Surfer feels very similar, but sonically, far different. It feels like the culmination of all his work throughout the 2020s: the quiet and gentle ‘333’, the chaos of ‘Cold Visions’, the manic experimentation of ‘Spiderr’. Bladee quarries all the best aspects of these projects, and moulds them together into something new.
The record is produced entirely by long-time collaborator, Whitearmor, the backbone behind most of Bladee’s work. Sulfur sees him pull off some of his best stuff to date, which is saying a lot given his résumé. Making atmospheric, ethereal soundscapes is second nature to him at this point.
Sulfur Surfer walks a thin tightrope between apathetic and spiritual. Bladee’s existential crisis is in full swing here, as is his obsession with mythology. He repeatedly chants “I hereby declare war on the evil star, I demand its defeat” on the opening title track and then proceeds to chant “black dragon” on the tracks back-end, maybe as a reference to Norse mythology.
The record’s definitive track for me has to be the enigmatic ‘Highland Tyrant’ which sees Bladee whispering and growling over one of Whitearmor’s best concoctions; an energetic drill drum-loop glides over his usual ambience. As Bladee croons “deep in the night, dark star arise” he then proceeds to growl unintelligibly like a black-metal front-man. That’s another trick Bladee had up his sleeve that we’d never have seen coming.
On the same track, we also see him evaluating his place in popular culture. Drain Gang and friends have always had a decent-sized cult following, with co-signs from alot of big names, (Zara Larsson, PinkPantheress, and Drake to name a few.) Yet Bladee still feels a sense of rejection from the industry.
“They don’t wanna open doors ‘til we kick it with Saint George,” he claims, implying his leaning into spirituality was what finally gained them some sort of access into mainstream culture,
“Now you wanna sweep the floors, brush the dust and shine the board,” implies that now, only in retrospect to their influence that they’ve now gained the respect they deserve. It’s a sort of spitefulness Bladee rarely ever shows.
Sulfur Surfer also bares only one feature. ‘Fox & Birch’ gets a closing monologue from folk singer, David Tibet.
It feels more like spoken word poetry than an actual song closer. And his medieval rambling backed with an acoustic guitar makes this song feel like some ancient forest poem. I’m left feeling like I’m on my way to slay a dragon.
Another highlight’s the beautifully haunting ‘Under my Umbrella’, which first feels like a throwaway from ‘333’, that’s until the hook kicks in, “Exhale, can’t feel, can’t deal” he whispers ominously, in a sort of quiet yet high pitched distortion that makes him sound like an alien (thank god for Genius Lyrics.)
The closer’s a true rarity for Drain Gang – a track that’s a whole six minutes long. The first half sees him whispering in his usual manner over heavenly synths, which then transition to acoustic guitars, “From all these years of work, for what?” he ponders.
It’s hard to say if Sulfur Surfer would impress a Drain Gang sceptic. It’s perhaps Bladee’s messiest work to date and even the most devoted of Drainers seem split on it. But most of his work takes a good 10 listens to properly digest and get your head around. One thing’s for sure, we’re not getting upbeat and fun Bladee back anytime soon. He sounds more contemplative and anguished than ever.
