Bilal comes through with "West Side Girl" the second single from his forthcoming album A Love Surreal just about a month on from the video release for "Back To Love." Judging from the title you might expect this wold be some ol' "I feel pretty/I just met a girl named Maria" type stuff but, no. It is actually a funky synthesizer driven throwback to the early 80s that recalls the most jammable work of the extended Parliament-Funkadelic family--think "Frantic Moment" by Eddie Hazel, or maybe Bootsy's "Working For My Baby" and you got the general vibe. As Bilal himself told Billboard:
Only had the opportunity to listen to it obsessively 3 or 4 times but so far those listens bear out Bilal's self-analysis and I can already tell that I'm gonna have the phrase:
"'West Side Girl' is a feel good, funky groove party jam created by me and my soul brothers, [producer] Shafiq Husayn and [co-writer] Stephen "Thundercat" Bruner."
In my head more or less permanently. Stream below and cherchez la femme on the full album, now slated to drop on February 26th.
"You ain't gotta talk a lick / body talk a lotta sh*t..."