Brockhampton is one of the music acts I have the most nostalgia with. I remember finding the original Saturation when it came out and immediately becoming obsessed. The rest of that summer was spent listening to that project and watching the American Boyband television show about the group on Vice. I remember being in Canada waiting for our tour to walk on a literal glacier, and my brothers showing me the “Gummy” trailer with Kevin Abstract’s head rapping on a sofa. A month after that, I was watching my brother’s JV soccer game when they released one of their biggest songs, “Sweet”. And then being surprised when later that night they released a new single to announce the third Saturation. They were also one of my earlier concerts in 2018 and I vividly remember them playing “Star” five times in a row to end the show and it landing just as hard each time. Them and their music have soundtracked some of the most memorable moments of those few months.
After that tour they did in 2018, they started to grow off me a bit more. Ameer was accused of sexual assault and kicked out of the group. They recorded their major label debut album, Iridescence, in 10 days at Abbey Road Studios. That made the project have flashes of genius, but the controversy around the group left them mixed between trying to have fun and process their emotions. A similar thing happened with 2019’s Ginger as well. They didn’t make it in a short period of time, but everything on this project feels like it has a depressing tone to it. It does have their biggest hit on it, “Sugar”, and that song is flat out amazing, but the project as a whole is just solid to me.
Even though I still enjoyed both of those projects, the feeling of the Saturation trilogy was gone. They weren’t teenagers now. They had gone from all moving into a house in Los Angeles together, to dealing with the pressures of fame and losing a longtime friend in such a short period of time. They were hosting group therapy sessions with Shia Labeouf to try and help themselves through this period. Unfortunately for them, after FKA twigs came out against Shia citing sexual battery, assault, and inciting emotional distress, they realized that who they thought was over his problems was only getting substantially worse during the same time he was preaching to them. They had no guide, seemed to still be in a dark place, and had not officially released music in over a year. The impact the group was having on its audience was wavering more than ever.
Brockhampton finally returned in early 2021 with a couple social media teasers. There were a couple snippets, a lot of pictures, and even a couple glowing reviews from RZA and Rick Rubin on their Youtube channel. At the end of March, the first single and an album release date was finally out. “Buzzcut” with Danny Brown was not only surprising because of the feature, but because it was easily one of their best bangers since their Saturation era. Instead of trying to shove everyone into each song, the only member with a full verse is Kevin, which is one of his most aggressive versus ever. Danny Brown can never miss with his feature and this stays with his pattern of great versus, especially with his line about alphas and incels. It also ends up transitioning perfectly into an airy outro with some nice singing from Joba over some horns and strings. This song instantly raised the expectations for this album and weirdly, it doesn’t end up representing the album.
This album is far from constant bangers all the way through. Instead, the project goes through waves of those bangers, enticing pop songs, emotional ballads, more traditional hip hop posse cuts, and even an acapella gospel track. Every Brockhampton album has a sizable amount of diversity, but this might be the most sonically diverse yet. They’re not experimental on here, but that’s not the appeal of their music. They’ve never been the group to be the best rappers, the best technical singers, had the most grand production, etc. Brockhampton is at their best when they emotionally connect with the listener, and they do it throughout most of this album.
The beginning of the project has the highest ratio of bangers. The aforementioned “Buzzcut” opens the project on the high, but is quickly followed up by “Chain On”. This was actually a song that they made in 2020 for their Technical Difficulties series and it remains largely unchanged here. The minimal production loop is the same, and JPEGMAFIA shows up for his same amazing verse, but Dom also adds an equally fascinating verse for the back half of the record. “Bankroll” is another track that’s been around for a while, this time since they teased it for a tour announcement in 2018. It now sounds almost completely redone and has quality features from A$AP Ferg and a chorus from A$AP Rocky. Rocky does show back up on the previous track too, “Count on Me”. It’s the lone poppier song out of these first four and features both Ryan Beatty and Shawn Mendes on the chorus. This summer likely still won’t be fully ready back to normal, but this is definitely one of the songs for the summer that are on this album. I’ve seen some hate for this one, probably because of the basic production, but I personally just can’t get enough of the chorus.
The pop songs come back again after a couple tracks (we’ll get back to those later) and dominate the middle of the album. Iconic singer Charlie Wilson shows up on the fairly tame “I’ll Take You On” and adds some luxurious harmonies. The song overall is one of the tracks on there that fits a lot better with the album than it does by itself. The same goes for the next track, “Old News” with up-and-coming singer Baird. They’re not bad at all, but there’s nothing that makes them stand out among Brockhampton’s discography or anything else made in this style.
Luckily, the pace picks back up with the guitar driven “What’s The Occasion”. This one combines some heavy electric guitar and the old G-funk synths they’ve used before. The song features Joba doing vocals for everything besides one verse and his emotion bleeds through the track. It’s summed up in the first line of Joba’s verse when he says, “I stay runnin’ from something I can’t see.” There’s a fantastic guitar solo that ends the track sounding like a victorious movie anthem. “When I Ball” is another personal favorite, and a big reason is because of the Chad Hugo produced beat. These lush pianos and strings make for a perfect backdrop for a track that’s about reminiscing on childhood. I’m always a sucker for Kevin’s pitch-shifted vocals and this one’s no exception. It’s another one of the lyrical gems on the project, “You always used to tell me, I could be anything I want to be. But it’s hard to see, it’s hard to be.”
They do take a quick break from pulling at the heartstrings to instead look at heavy topics like racism and homophobia. “Don’t Shoot Up The Party” doesn’t go that deep into the topics like the emotional tracks did, but this track sounds straight out of the G-Funk era in the best way possible. It’s easily one of the best bangers on the project. The penultimate track is “Dear Lord”, the previously talked about acapella track delivered by Bearface, but the backing vocals are all of Brockhampton’s members and people of their extended universe. It’s a beautiful setup to the heartbreaking ending of the project with “The Light Pt. II”.
“The Light” and “The Light Pt. II” are almost diary entries for Kevin and Joba on their respective hardships. For Kevin, he delivers a verse on each track about dealing with his family and childhood. In particular, the second verse looks at his relationship with his mother. She had previously stopped talking to him after being unable to accept the fact that Kevin is gay. Kevin ends the verse showing how even though his mom and him are back on good terms, she still hasn’t fully accepted his sexuality, “Me and her just got on good terms. Thank God for them unexpected turns. Breaks her heart when she see my city burn. Thank God for teaching me how to learn. Have empathy, even when it burns. But I hate that she got me in this box, expectin' me to see the light.” It’s a powerful verse, but Joba easily tops it.
On both songs, Joba talks about the recent suicide of his father and how it affected him. He talks about his relationship with his father, what he’ll tell his kids about the incident, where he thinks his father is now, the memories they had together, and so much more. Each verse just tears the listener apart and even though it doesn’t make for a happy ending, it’s a powerful one. Joba ends the project on the anti-suicide chorus, “The light is worth the wait, I promise. Wait, why did you do it? The light is worth the wait, I promise. Wait, screamin' "Please don't do it.” The whole song really is something powerful and hard to even try and write about myself, let alone for Kevin and Joba. Brockhampton reminds us with this project that The Light is worth the wait and that’s the most valuable lesson one can remember.
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