"I've been down here, stranded indefinitely / I can't reach my planet, but I need to leave"
i never really had the opportunity to listen to R&B growing up. real missed opportunity there. i want to listen to more, which to an extent kinda sucks because i really don't know where to start. this was a pretty good introduction, though.
These Songs reminds me a lot of another one of my favorite albums from last year, Londra by Qendresa. singer and songwriter Aliah Sheffield has a beautiful voice, which is backed up by some very groovy instrumentation. the bass in particular really gets a lot of time to shine, which is nice! i love bass guitar. wish i got to hear it more. unfortunately, i feel that Sheffield's voice is kind of wasted by how repetitive some of the songs can be. Some Of Your People really gets shafted: the first half is a great introduction but the rest of the song is the same phrase repeated what feels like 60 times. the album as a whole has a tendency to just feel kind of disconnected: it's not a concept album, but the whole thing just feels kinda disjointed, y'know? Boo Boo The Fool doesn't feel like it belongs on the same album as Some Of Your People, y'know?
still, though, These Songs isn't a bad album. i just think it's pretty generic. Sheffield has a wonderful voice and the instrumentation is nice—i like the acoustics on I Don't Like People going into the drop—but i just can't imagine myself listening to these songs (pun not intended) in a vacuum and imagining they're from the same album. the whole project is just sorta... fine. i don't think there's any other way for me to really describe it. it's also ridiculously short: just 24 minutes! i really think that this album should've been maybe double the length and make every song more clearly connected to each other.
still, though, it's a nice album. the songs are nice to listen to, and as i've said again and again, Aliah Sheffield is a beautiful singer. it's at least worth a listen.
