Consumer Guide Album

Little Simz: No Thank You [Forever Living Originals/AWAL, 2022]
This girlish Anglo-Nigerian rapper will turn 29 this month, no longer really little in the immature sense. Blessed with a soprano that remains not just cute and articulated but occasionally incisive, she's free to put serious effort into getting past the usual music-biz shortfalls--"Turn wine into water and get blood out of a stone" is how she brags it. And though she was a fighter not a lover last time, she's gotten over that hump: "Don't need much as long as I got my baby he's a rider." So what is it all for, really? "Scrutinized for freeing the truth about the system/All she wanted to do was uplift the women." A-