The Singles Jukebox

That’s not a pitch-shifted Billie Holiday in the chorus, surely?

[Video][Website]
[7.40]

Anthony Easton: I am terrible at figuring out samples, and so this might be really obvious, or I might be terribly wrong — but do the super-lush, whipped-cream cloud strings in this come from Duke Ellington’s work about the lush life? Even if they don’t, they are fantastic. 
[8]

Iain Mew: It gives me the same overwhelming hit of nostalgia, emotion and harps as “Maple Leaves” by Jens Lekman, except with Bacharach, stacks and raps instead of Mark E Smith and autumn. The title word is turned into a sob at the magnificence of it all.
[9]

Patrick St. Michel: No offense aimed at Lushlife, who is a plenty capable rapper here and sounds fine, but I wish I could just listen to that woozy instrumental for three minutes. 
[7]

Alfred Soto: If he doesn’t approach the title “rap’s Henry James,” give him credit, thanks to a nostalgia-suffused sample, for being rap’s Booth Tarkington, which also implies that he’s a good not great writer.
[7]

Ian Mathers: Fuck it, I’m a sucker for harp loops and that pitched-down vocal sample. He realizes that brevity is the soul of wit, which helps.
[7]

Brad Shoup: For some of us, Avalanches nostalgia is an evergreen undertaking, a perennial mope. “Magnolia” summons that beloved Bakelite balearic vibe with scary ease: sped-down choirs; a monepic chorus that’s practically Proustian; those transparently-manipulated and -manipulative harps. Of course, this is all springboard for the boom-bap, which currently rests on its own pleasant historic cloud. But it’s more than vibes. The phrases are compact, the tour breakneck; I finished the song feeling like I’d swallowed a city block. Toss in a lovely Rammellzee tribute and a deeply moving music video, and I’m actually missing summer.
[9]

Jonathan Bogart: Dusty hip-hop nostalgia gets refracted through many more lenses than dusty rock or blues or even jazz nostalgia does. That doesn’t necessarily make it any more meaningful; it’s the kid’s heady backpacker talent that does that.
[6]

Edward Okulicz: The obvious touchstone for the music is “Since I Left You” (the song, but maybe the album too) by The Avalanches, if they’d had enough money left over after clearning the samples to get a rapper in, and certainly “Magnolia” is as sweeping and lovely. Where it falls slightly short of its progenitor is that rather than each part flowing seamlessly into the next, the distorted sigh of the title phrase breaks up the loveliness and sounds weirdly out of place with Lushlife’s verses, and rather than being breathtaking, it’s merely pretty.
[7]

Will Adams: The sharp delivery grounds the feather-light production, but the best moments are when the pitched-down sample breathes and the harps sweep across the track. Lushlife’s understated performance gives way to a gorgeous outro: the harps stutter, ricochet, and eventually create their own rhythm, one I could listen to for hours.
[7]

Ramzi Awn: Harps and brand names and bells, oh my! 
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