Best New Tracks - Pitchfork

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Earl Sweatshirt: "Sunday" [ft. Frank Ocean] Posted: 16 Aug 2013 02:10 PM PDT Front page photo by Erez Avissar Though it's been a year since Earl Sweatshirt and Frank Ocean teamed up for Channel Orange's most memorable duet, "Super Rich Kids" and "Sunday" sound like two sides of the same weekend: a Saturday night spent lackadaisically popping bottles and pills only to wake up 10 hours later, head full of mush, swearing off all substances forever. "Everything's a little different since I stopped smoking pot/ Nightmares got more vivid since I stopped smoking pot," Earl spits. And I do mean spits-- one of his signature tricks is dribbling out each line with such a bummed-out nonchalance that you (almost) forget the impeccable control he has over every single one of his words. For the first minute or so, the track's mood is as ominous as a late-afternoon storm cloud, threatening rain but never quite brimming over. Then all of a sudden we're under a disorientingly clear sky, as a familiar voice cuts in with this cruising-altitude flow: This is your captain Frank, rapping. Ocean's appearance on "Sunday" is the polar opposite of that other big guest verse that happened this week-- unlike Kendrick, he's not here to show off his hunger, or aggression, or virtuosity. He's as indifferent to the beat as Chris Brown was to his Grammy win. And that's the whole point. Aggressors can only understand the message when it's spelled out in the language of aggression, so I'm guessing Breezy had to listen to this thing at least five times before he realized it was a TKO. Ocean's a lowercase letter in a caps lock world, and the brilliance here is how he turns the guest verse into an act of civil disobedience. It might sound quiet, but it's brash as fuck. Earl Sweatshirt: "Sunday" [ft. Frank Ocean] on SoundCloud.