Often known for music that’s intertwined with his sense of humor and entertaining personality, the independent Vancouver-based artist bbno$ has often been regarded as a meme rapper. His latest release “help herself” shows that he is far from just that. With the help of up-and-coming producer Diamond Pistols, “help herself” is a stark contrast from what listeners have become used to expecting from bbno$ with the song taking listeners in a new, more vulnerable direction.
bbno$ gained widespread recognition as a viral sensation through the massive successes of his collaboration with producer Y2K, “Lalala”. Since then he’s kept a steady flow of music dropping from various collabs with fellow jokester Yung Gravy to original music like his most recent full-length album ‘good luck have fun’ which was released last year. Normally a massively successful touring artist, in addition to using downtime from the COVID-19 pandemic to make new music and experiment with new styles, he has also become quite the successful video game streamer; offering fans a new way to connect with him through the bbnogames moniker that he uses to stream popular games like Minecraft and Among Us to his fans (which he refers to as gamers).
Most of, if not all of bb’s musical releases since “Lalala” have all seemed to follow the overarching humorous theme. “help herself” changes that narrative completely, seeing the artist experiment with not only more serious lyrical content but also a fresh sonic makeup different than the thumpy, party-esque tracks he’s come to be known for. The song features a soft layered guitar loop on top of a driving alt rock influenced drum beat and bass line. The stylistic influences are a change of pace, but the real differentiator is the lyrical content.
The track is a bit of an oxymoron, featuring a somewhat happy and upbeat backtrack paired with some serious more depressing lyrics that follow the relationship of two dysfunctional people. Some artists seem to find their comfort zone and are never able to get out of it, but bb seems to be challenging his comfort zone and it’s definitely paying off with a refreshing new direction.
We can expect more experimentation soon to come from bbno$, as he is eager to cement himself as a major, multi-faceted artist in 2021.
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