Ugly (also referred to as UGLY, an acronym for "U Gotta Love Yourself"[3]) is the third studio album by British rapper Slowthai. It was released on 3 March 2023 through Method Records and Interscope Records. The album features Slowthai introducing punk and rock elements to his sound,[4] which received acclaim from critics.
Background
Ugly comes after Slowthai's critically acclaimed 2021 album, Tyron. On 25 January 2023, Slowthai released the song "Selfish", and revealed the album's title that same day.[5]
On 7 February 2023, Slowthai released the song "Feel Good".[6] In a statement, Slowthai revealed that he "wanted to emulate the brotherhood ethos that bands have". In an interview with The Fader, Slowthai discussed how this is his most personal album yet and the new direction he has taken sonically. In another interview with Apple Music after the release of the album, he stated the following: "delving into this gave me that freedom again, I felt inspired. I wanted to do something new and challenge myself, rather than just doing what's expected of me."[7]
The title track features Irish post-punk band Fontaines D.C., whom Slowthai met at the 2019 Mercury Prize ceremony, performing the instrumental.[8]Jockstrap's Taylor Skye helped produce the song "Tourniquet".[9]
Upon release, Ugly was met with widespread acclaim from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 80, based on 16 critical reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".[11]
Robin Murray of Clash called the album "a bold attempt to embrace [Slowthai's] contradictions" and "held together by the brutal strength of slowthai's performances."[22] Lisa Wright of DIY gave the album five stars and commented, "Ugly is a beautiful thing to behold."[14]Alexis Petridis of The Guardian gave the album five stars and named it the album of the week, calling it "severe, noisy and occasionally pushing."[23] Helen Brown of The Independent commented, "On Ugly, he uses rock music as an alarm bell to jolt himself back to reality."[16] Hayley Milross of The Line of Best Fit wrote that "Ugly displays an artistic freedom regained, reconnecting with what drew him to music in the first place. It's a creative direction that will most likely not stick around, but that's what makes it that bit more authentic."[24] Thomas Smith of NME opined that the album "is a warts-and-all reckoning" and Slowthai's "most exhilarating project to date from front to back."[25] Reviewing the album for AllMusic, Paul Simpson concluded that, "Ugly is less of a major stylistic shift than it might seem, as slowthai harnesses his punkish energy in a way that seems natural and fitting. It's clearly a challenging, confrontational album, but it also feels like the artist's purest expression yet."[12]
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