The actor and musician Donald Glover has had a frantic few years. Starring in this year’s Amazon series remake of Mr & Mrs Smith, as well as writing a Star Wars spinoff film and voicing Simba in the live-action Lion King, his musical project as Childish Gambino has taken a backseat. Now returning with his sixth album, Bando Stone & The New World, Glover has said it will be his last before retiring the Gambino alter ego.
Soundtracking an accompanying film of the same name, Bando Stone traverses everything from trap to guitar-strumming pop-punk and jazz across its 17 tracks, producing a sprawling, confounding work. Opening with the hammering synth lines of Kanye West Yeezus-era ripoff Hearts Were Meant to Fly, the pastiches continue with the soulful melodies of Survive, which sounds like Flower Boy-era Tyler, the Creator, and Happy Survival, featuring Khruangbin, which sounds entirely like a mellow composition of their own making.
Glover fares better on his own terms, as on the sultry funk of In the Night, the R&B balladry of Steps Beach and the Latin jazz jam of No Excuses, but these tracks feel lost amid his genre-hopping. On his final album, Glover throws everything at the wall but little sticks.
