Donald Glover needs no introduction at this point. Coming off of Redbone and then This Is America becoming a cultural landmark in 2018, there was heavy anticipation for his next album. Fans theorized it would come in 2018 after the release of This is America and the Summer Pack EP, but it didn’t. Well, maybe it would be before his festival tour, which included headlining Coachella and the release of his music heavy short film, Guava Island, but it didn’t. When it finally hit streaming services on March 22nd, after being streamed for 12 hours on donaldgloverpresents.com, fans were relieved to finally have a new album after all these years. Did it live up to the hype? Well, you’ll probably get a different answer from each person you ask, so let's see what I think.
Musically, this project has some of Gambino’s best moments. The ending track, 53:49, is one of the best album outros of the year so far, with Gambino having some extremely high energetic verses with the uplifting chorus leaves the listener with a smile on their face. Time featuring Ariana Grande is another favorite. The chorus of this song was originally teased in the Guava Island film, with a children’s choir singing it. But here we get Gambino with some heavy, metallic vocal effects on his voice, which contrasts nicely with Ariana’s soft voice in her versus.
But there were quite a few moments that left most listeners scratching their heads, especially on first listen. 32.22 sounds like tribal music in the year 3000 and had their voices so processed that it’s hard to even tell if there’s words. The next cut, 35.31, sounds like it could be on a Disney Soundtrack, but by the time he says “Quarter brick, half a brick, whole brick, yay”, it’s evident that the song is about dealing cocaine. The album cover and song titles are confusing to say the least. The cover is a plain, off-white square, and the vast majority of the song titles are just the timestamp at which they start in the album. Only two of the twelve have actual song titles (Algorhythm and Time). It’s clear that this album is not for the passive listener.
For the listeners that are patient enough to listen to immerse themselves in this project, I do think things start to become more enjoyable. Especially in the times of Covid-19, listening to this project feels like what we’re all experiencing right now. Everything is jumbled together and the project gets thrown from one sound to another, seemingly at random. Just like our brains are constantly worrying about having enough money to survive, online classes for the foreseeable future, the health of our loved ones, as well as the health of ourselves. There was a drawing that was put up with the livestream of the album with a city skyline on fire and people in a panic doing everything from jumping off a building to taking a selfie. It’s a fascinating drawing to find the details of, just like how this album is going to stay in rotation picking up more things with each listen. Hopefully it will become clearer with time, just like this situation.
Must Listen Tracks: Time, 53.49, 19.10, 12.38, Algorhythm
Score: 8-8.5/10
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