Listen!! Santigold - Master of My Make-Believe

Have you heard of Santigold? If you have, then you have been with me, eagerly awaiting her follow up album Master of My Make-Believe, which dropped yesterday. If you haven not heard her before NOW IS THE TIME.

Hubs and I were able to see her 3 years ago when she was touring with her first self-titled album. She was awesome. Ever since, we've been waiting. And waiting. And waiting.... and the wait has paid off. Master of My Make-Believe is fantastic!

Santigold released Disparate Youth about a month ago to promote her new album, and my husband and I have had this song on repeat ever since. It never gets old. It's definitely one of my favorite songs of 2012.

Santigold also released this single Big Mouth prior to the album's release. It's amazing, holy drum and bass, people!!

NPR is still streaming the entire album for free so you can listen to it by single, or let the entire album play. Don't just take my word for it, go listen! NPR First Listen: Master of My Make-Believe. Their bio and writeup of the album is perfect:

Hand it to Santi White: If she's pursuing stardom on a massive scale, she's forgoing the easiest routes. The artist formerly known as Santogold now calls herself Santigold, and took an eternal four years to follow her frequently dazzling debut, only to strip her second album of the ingratiating fizziness that marked songs like "Lights Out." Master of My Make-Believe, out May 1, has its playfully bouncy moments — she says it's inspired in part by a trip to Jamaica — but its overall tone is one of severity, even solemnity. It's as if pop music caught up with Santigold's sound, and she tacked left to avoid the glare.

As uncompromising in her own way as M.I.A., whose music attacks more viscerally, Santigold seems ambivalent about most everything she touches on Master of My Make-Believe — especially success, if "Fame" is any indication. Even the profanity-laced "Look at These Hoes" seems to straddle the line between loathing material excess and embracing it; in that case, the result feels deadpan to the point of half-heartedness.

With its frequent nods to island rhythms — and the aid of collaborators from old standbys Diplo and Switch to Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Karen O — Master of My Make-Believe has a sprawl to it that belies its 38-minute run time. As a result, whether a given song comes out as a jolt ("Freak Like Me") or a trot ("Pirate in the Water"), Master of My Make-Believe feels packed and filling. But fun has been edged out of the equation a bit, in favor of an emphasis on ferocity and artistry that's increasingly hard to deny.