Backxwash : Only Dust Remains
Prior Backxwash albums like I Lie Here Buried with My Rings and My Dresses found Canada’s Ashanti Mutinta methodically smothering her rap with death-metal screams and clanging percussion loops. On her newest LP Only Dust Remains, she drops that industrialized shroud of production in favor of more accessible trap sampling and arrangements meant for a proper band. In clarifying the medium, Backxwash ends up clarifying her message.
By adopting an overall clearer sound, Backxwash here suggests an affinity for rap-rock and nu-metal. There are various obvious callbacks to 1990s-era raging against machines, with Backxwash even going so far as to nick a familiar title—“Wake Up”—and spit hot fire like Zach de la Rocha against actual triggers and loops, instead of Tom Morello guitar-based stand-ins for them. Only Dust Remains trades dissonance for musicality, allowing us to better comprehend Mutinta’s stances on topics like queer agency, Palestine, and chronic illness.
Backxwash definitely appears engaged in some of the same battles with the state that Kendrick Lamar is, and uses some of the same aural ammunition. There’s her often desperate cadence for one, as well as female vocals sampled from aboriginal music, gospel, and Nina Simone that soften the thematic blow of songs like “Undesirable” and the title track. However, where K.Dot also takes his fight to the street, Backxwash takes hers inward, grappling with identity and purpose. She wonders aloud in “9th Heaven” and elsewhere if her struggles are meaningful let alone successful, and who might take them up alongside her or in her absence.
Only Dust Remains is Backxwash’s declaration that she’s sick and tired of being sick and tired—not just waving another middle finger at enemies but waving one at supposed allies as well, up to and including God. As energetic as this album is, you can tell it’s full of activism fatigue, acknowledging that constantly fighting trauma constitutes a form of trauma itself.
Label: Ugly Hag
Year: 2025
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