warning before reading: i'm just gonna glaze
whenever i'd talk about ravyn lenae's music in my day-to-day i would always have the same repeated points: "shelf life undefeated. most slept on r&b heavyweight. would've made a classic collab with prime erykah badu but y'all not ready for that conversation."
dating back to her moon shoes ep, she's always just had a knack for making songs that stand the test of time. Even when the tracks blast to indie-community stardom (where they're prized for being niche) or when they reach the radio (where they're prized for being catchy), you can really never get enough.
I think this is the project where ravyn fully realized her strength for making an earworm. Her style of writing, that silky falsetto, grooves with a lil twist. every single song has a chorus, bridge, or riff that will inevitably be stuck in my ear for days to come. years later when i rediscover, it's always just as good if not better. steve lacy here boosts this even further, providing wonderful synergy and keeping the sauce up.
like.. they both can sang, yes, right. but when they together?? they be sang sang sangin, yknow?? this along with steve's (arguably now classic) indie production that he was just beginning to saturate the scene with??? boneappleteeth, yes, love it, give me more.
Compared to both of their more recent works, it's definitely the mark of an era I've only come to appreciate more :'). at this time, much of the alternative r&b wave was just breaking out. new creative heights were reached, and so many artists were actively influencing their own contemporaries. 2016-2018 reminds me of the "soulquarian boom" of the late 90s - early 2000s.
