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Music

Chill the Fuck Out and Listen to Jamie Isaac's Debut Album 'Couch Baby'

Roll up, roll up. This is the quintessential "sitting at home and smoking weed with your friends" record.
Daisy Jones
London, GB

If the music world was exactly how it looked from the outside, you might be tempted to believe that Britain’s defining sounds were the soaring break up ballads of Adele, the folk-lite strums of Ed Sheeran and James Bay, and the comforting, omnipresent synth lines of Calvin Harris. However, as we all know, this has never been the case. The sound of Britain has always been a world that exists separately from Radio 1 interviews, the Brit Awards and broadsheet newspaper’s end-of-year lists. It’s a sound that has grown and thrived in the clubs, on the streets and online.

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Arguably, right at the crest of that sound is South London. And slap bang in the middle of South London is Jamie Isaac. Only a handful of months ago, Jamie Isaac dropped a mixtape of super chill remixes that had been cut, spliced, added to, and stuck back together by King Krule, Rejjie Snow, Jesse James and Black Mack among others. But his debut album, which we’re premiering below, is 100 percent him, with no guests whatsoever.

Listen, and you'll hear the smooth and contemplative roots of the jazz music that Jamie Isaac grew up on. Lean in closer, and perhaps you'll be able to smell the scent of weed reek and overflowing ashtrays. Look outward and you'll see the leaf-green parks, cornershops, and looming haze-ridden skylines that have intricately seeped their nuanced details into the sound of the record. Which reminds us, we haven't told you what that record is called yet. The name is Couch Baby, which is fitting since the whole thing is kinda like a chill-as-fuck-ode to sweating it away on the couch in the middle of summer, until your body marinates in the stimulating atmosphere of the room and soaks in all the friends, drinks, and objects that've resided in there for the last few hours.

I guess what we're saying is: this is the quintessential "sitting at home and smoking weed with your friends record". It is the new king of the hill. More than sounding like a modern-day classic for every red-eyed and cotched out music fan though, Couch Baby is also a triumphant achievement in blissed out ambience and is, perhaps, the greatest album of its kind we've heard so far this year.

Listen below and pre-order the record for yourself here.