4/5
willow is a player.
Beyoncé. Taylor Swift. Norah Jones. Maggie Rogers. Sheryl Crow. St. Vincent last week...and on this album for the ruling love of 'pain for fun'. The big guns have brought out some of their best albums this year. But don't forget about Willow Smith. Daddy certainly doesn't, proudly posting her big Tiny Desk Concert powerhouse performance on his Instagram ahead of Willow's New Music Friday release of 'empathogen', going head-to-head with the legacy making likes of Dua Lipa and Sia. Uncle DJ Jazz Jeff getting in on the act, proclaiming that "she's a superstar" in the comments. She surely is, and before you throw Towns out the house, like the late, great Uncle Phil when he was wearing that one shirt Big Poppa would be proud of, for being obvious, just wait. She really is. Rocking and rolling with wicked wisdom, following her last two diverse, defiant and definitive albums ('<COPINGMECHANISM>' and 'lately I feel EVERYTHING'). Raging hard against the nepotism machine, all whilst bringing the most famous family back from the brink like 'Bad Boys: Ride Or Die'.
Riding together, living forever, Willow generates more than a sense of empathy with her latest, and maybe greatest album. Set off by the kinetic single 'run!' and big records with Vincent (seamlessly sounding alike as they weave between verses in chorus) and the American symphony of Oscar and Grammy grabber Jon Batiste, coming 'home'. Classic like the amazing album artwork neo-soul's D'Angelo would be proud of to the grill, this is the bare truth, with emotionally naked ambition for the young star with a legendary legacy that is all her own to do exactly that with. Mastering her style and the full-width character of her 'b i g f e e l i n g s' like a Prince, or a Soulchild of Musiq like Maxwell would write it. This is bigger than Taylor. Better than Beyoncé's. Solange knows. Pop ain't playing. Willow wouldn't whip her hair again if you asked her. And now she doesn't need to...as if she ever did. By industry standards she's reset, the 23-year-old is already an 'ancient girl' as she sings for her legend, "Whisper softly the story of that ancient girl/Entranced with the elders in their caves/Drink sacrament, overflowing telling secrets/In the dark lies a story of that ancient." Poetic and powerful prose for the pros. It's just a 'symptom of life' you can't refrain from, singing "Feeling absence of time/Knowing all is decided/There's nothing here left to find/The story's all in my mind/Pushing and peeling the layers that cover my mind/Looking into the shadow, now I notice the light/Magic is real, when you see it inside, you decide," in beautiful black and white over the kind of artwork look that mama said looks like Lenny Kravitz at his early days best. Are you listening, Zoë?
Are you gonna go this way? Because "like a snake shedding skin/creating life to begin," Willow is here to stay, like the Disney + remake show of the same name should have. Hollywood may have tried to clear house with her father, but for the daughter of her own destiny, 'the fear is not real'. Just a 'false self' if you think that. Willow has already broken out, come of age, and all those other clichés. This is simply a star in her stride, striking with her most searing stroke. On 'no words 1 & 2' she gives you plenty, as she instrumentally plays. Then coming back out on 'down', she gives you more, "So far/Not sure who we are/Warm hands touch my heart/Make friends with the dark, see/I won't ever let you down/Down/Down/No more/Illusions control/My center unwavering/Let us see." Letting you know in just these few, that she'd do it all. Risking it like, "Sometimes I don't wanna try/To calm the chaos inside/And I just let out a sigh, I just sigh/Don't know why, but it feels right/Flowing free like the sea/I can just sit here and be/And only listen to me, it's just me/In this moment of the purest devotion," 'between i and she'. It all comes to a head on the penultimate, quotable 'i know that face'" like this one you'll never forget. "I know that face that you make when you're scared to see/All the shadows in your mind I know you're not facing me, endlessly racing/Let me show you what it's like to know/Light and dark is just a place called home." Recognizable like the nostalgia of memory. These songs and this singer as you sing along. The most powerful pathogen. Oneness that you can relate to without the communion of prescribed drug abuse. But something with a much stronger substance. One of great depth and feeling. Let's hope others connect and understand. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Playlist Picks: 'run!', 'home (Feat. Jon Batiste), 'pain for fun (Feat. St. Vincent)'.
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