Brisbane-based Fijian rapper Jesswar is tired of being overlooked, and in this bass-heavy collection of songs, she detangles feelings of ambivalence. “Bitch I’m coming through, tell them lames make room,” she snarls on the boisterous lead single Medusa. With this warning, Jesswar uses brute force and contorts her voice — weaving in and out of snarling and languid braggadocio — over liquid trap beats. Whether she’s boasting about her showmanship (Laylow), tackling misogyny with a wry wink (Saucy) or laying down irreverent lines that deserve a live audience to feed off (XXL), Jesswar’s presence is magnetic. Venom, a song that ricochets off the walls with undulating passion, fortifies Jesswar’s message that she’s coming for everyone in this industry who underestimated her: “I know they waiting for the day that I leave/But I wrote this song just to haunt ’em in their dreams.” In an interview with Apple Music, the rapper said, “Waking up every day and watching how women of colour are constantly overlooked in the music industry really pissed me off.” Tropixx is Jesswar’s case in point: rambunctious, uncompromising and electrifying, it’s a moment that’s impossible to ignore. KISH LAL

ROCK

Middle Kids

TODAY WE’RE THE GREATEST (EMI)

★★★½

“I got questions and you got answers, and I’m not sure if they’re fact or fiction,” sings Hannah Joy on Questions, a surging, horn-fuelled track on the second album from Sydney trio Middle Kids. It is an impressive record that wants to wrestle with those doubts: in an era where pop music is readily accusatory, Joy believes in discovery and leans towards affirmation. “I’ll still be your fan,” she promises on the closing title track, and the pleasure of these songs lies in hearing that empathy win through. The trio – vocalist/guitarist Joy, bassist Tim Fitz and drummer Harry Day – got their too-long-on-the-road arena anthems out of the way on their top-10 debut, 2018’s Lost Friends, so now they are exploring texture and contrast. The character study of Cellophane (Brain) is driven by scratchy, distortion-tinged guitar, while an ethereal accordion lifts off into the contemplative zone on Golden Star. Hannah Joy does not find release in these songs, so much as engagement. While her voice has an immersive warmth, she is working at getting what she needs. Do not be distracted by I Don’t Care and its new-wave keyboard prompt: Middle Kids are making a stand in 2021. CRAIG MATHIESON

JAZZ

Avgenicos Brothers

TREADING WATER (Earshift)

★★★½

You relax into this music like it’s going to be a sonic hammock, and then out of nowhere, it smacks you on the jaw. The Avegicos brothers – trumpeter Tom and saxophonist Michael – have become pervasive in Sydney jazz circles over the last few years, and here they break cover with an album of their own that that keeps shape-shifting in mood, texture and even idiom. It also contains curious aesthetic juxtapositions, with the predictability of some of the compositional material seeming at odds with the prevailing imagination brought to bear in the improvising and in post-production. But at its best, there are such gusts of excitement and transportive moments as more than compensate for the occasionally sludgy themes. Joining the two horns are Felix Lalanne’s guitar (which lights up Blizzing), Novak Manojlovic’s keyboards, Nick Henderson’s bass and Alex Hirlian’s drums, who are tasked with making the sound-worlds woolly and even discombobulating, as well as energized. The more compelling compositions, such as the crunching Steady, lift the whole project, and give a sneaking suspicion that there is a much stronger record from these two still to come. JOHN SHAND