Nourished By Time – The Passionate Ones

Baltimore’s Marcus Brown, aka Nourished By Time, makes music that sounds like a party at the end of the world. ‘The Passionate Ones’ — his second album and second release for XL Recordings, following 2024’s ‘Catching Chickens EP’ — transforms late-stage capitalism, class struggle and existential dread into something strangely euphoric. Never has it been easier to vibe out to an album about the ruins of the American Dream.

Brown draws on a patchwork of sounds, from soul and funk to psychedelia and ’80s pop — filtered through influences as disparate as Meat Loaf, r&b trio SWV, and musical theatre. Tracks like ‘It’s Time’ anchor in distorted bass lines, while ‘Crazy People’ dials up the paranoia without ever losing its cosmic house groove. ‘When The War Is Over’, which imagines a dystopian future, swells with triumphant arpeggios over a hip-hop beat — a move reminiscent of the artist’s ‘Hell of a Ride’, easily one of 2024’s best tracks. The lilting guitar licks and key change teases in a track like ‘Tossed Away’ sound like a lost track from a ’90s boy band studio session, but Brown’s songwriting is so magnetic that, when drawing in off-kilter — and perhaps even unfashionable — sounds into his orbit, they feel fresh and inventive.