Single Review: Otis Mensah - No Record Store Day

From performing at the BBC Music Introducing Stage at Glastonbury in 2017, to becoming Poet Laureate of Sheffield in 2018; it appears that alternative hip-hop and spoken word artist, Otis Mensah is only going up in the world. With previous tracks challenging the typical model of masculinity, and the consequences of supressing emotions that can lead to negative mental health; his most recent single ‘No Record Store Day’ radiates a different message.

With crashing drums and prominent guitar riffs, ‘No Record Store Day’ differs from Mensah’s previous singles. Although the lyrics are still able to speak for themselves, the backing allows for ‘an assault’ on the senses to occur. The message behind the music is one that Mensah himself commented on in a recent interview with VIBE, “No Record Store Day is a reference to Record Store Day being postponed or cancelled and feeling like there’s a lack of places where I can now go for catharsis. That was what the song was, it was airing out some of those feelings of being stuck.”

As we find ourselves in a very different world to the one we inhabited four months ago, music like Mensah’s does give a lot of people the space to let go of the feelings of irritability and restlessness that we now associate with a global pandemic. With frantic lyrics bouncing from topic to topic, displaying pride and then immediately contrasting with fear and desperation, Mensah’s single almost needs a strong backing to have some kind of consistency and grounding to the piece. It is certainly a hard-hitting listen, documenting the challenges that we encounter in our world today.

Make sure you check out our interview with Otis Mensah here.

Words: Sophie Swift