Just a few bars into his new single “Save Me,” Stringz EMB generates a rough cut vibe that could be the most brooding of any he’s recorded in his career thus far, but this melodic climax is hardly the only high point in this track. From beginning to end, the layers of majestic audio that combine to form the fabric of this song are nothing short of spellbinding, and incredible producing is only part of the reason why. In reality, I have a feeling that Stringz EMB would be just as profound in his delivery regardless of the venue – from studio to stage, this is a player who knows how to make something larger than life minus the filler we commonly hear in progressive hip-hop in 2023.
The volume of the instrumentation in this single allows for the play to sound particularly imposing, but I wouldn’t say that the backdrop is so potent as to drown out the textural presence of the other parts in this mix at all. There’s a nice, evenhandedness to the structure of the arrangement that gives every instrument in this track a lot of room to breathe, and better yet, there’s rarely an instance in which Stringz EMB’s vocal isn’t riding atop the groove colorizing the adjacent harmony with as much emotion as his pipes can muster. He’s not biting off more than he can chew here, but he’s raising the bar for himself and his scene as it presently stands at the moment.
With regards to the tight construction of the verses and their beats, I think “Save Me” is made a lot more fluid through the confidence that Stringz EMB is presenting it with. He’s got such a warm swagger to his voice that it’s difficult to picture his not being completely relaxed in his performance here; everything is coming together naturally, leaving the need for plasticity and sonic synthetics of any kind at the door. There’s something to be said about players who have the kind of intimate relationship with their medium that this man does, and when taking into account the relatively short time this project has been getting spotlighted by the indie press, he deserves all the more acclaim for how much he’s influencing the narrative right now.
I haven’t any doubts as to whether or not we’re going to be hearing more quality music from this source in the next couple of years, and provided Stringz EMB sticks with the present artistic trajectory he’s on – which led to the creation of “Save Me” – I believe he’s going to find as much interest in his material on the mainstream side of the dial as he does the underground at the moment. The buzz surrounding his witty use of different sonic concepts is no joke, and after taking a close look at this all-new single just recently, I would have to agree with other critics who have been calling him one of the more underrated players in his scene today.
