Album #285: Sneaks – Happy Birthday

• Released: 2020
• Origin: Washington D.C., USA
• Label: Merge
• Best Track: This World

Spoken word artist Eva Moolchan, aka Sneaks, is widely described as both hip-hop and post-punk, which means there’s about an equal chance I’ll either think she’s great or won’t get it at all.

Her fifth album Happy Birthday came out in August and it turns out I’m pretty partial to it. There’s a definitely a post-punk minimalism and sense of repetition, especially on tracks like ‘Mars and Virgo’.

Elsewhere, she vents her spleen on society’s attitudes to race and gender on ‘This World’, with the stripped-down sound a fitting backdrop to this takedown of toxic attitudes.