I’m starting off straight up corny by saying I’ve been a “transparent soul” with anyone who’d listen to me about my anticipation of WILLOW’s sixth and latest solo LP, which finally dropped May 3rd.
My owning of my corniness, turns out, totally vibes with the messages about the freedom to express & accept your feelings, warts and all, coursing throughout the #greatalbum “empathogen” (2024).
Not only do I absolutely love how WILLOW wrestles lyrically (and musically) with Big Ideas such as existence, ego, anxiety, pain, self-sabotage, fear and love, she does so in such soul-felt, sophisticated & surprising ways, I have to compliment the precise production by WILLOW and her fellow producers Chris Greatti, Eddie Benjamin and Jon Batiste.
There are myriad sounds, echo effects and vocal arrangements involved in each track, even the stripped down ones, but none ever feel overdone — just purposeful and fresh. It’s as if WILLOW threw her hands into the cosmic river of music, tapped into its source, and allowed it to flow freely through her.
There’s a lot going on technically in the music I can’t speak on with any authority (e.g. the multiple time signatures, turnarounds, uncommon verse/chorus structures) but what I can talk about is how it hits the ears and how it feels — free, unexpected, relatable, or, in one word — embracing.
WILLOW is clearly a student of music and draws on varied influences (her IG post of her working her voice out to Ella Fitzgerald’s legendary scat on “How High The Moon” blew my mind a few months ago and still lives rent free in what’s left of my head), but right now she’s reminding me most of the great Esperanza Spalding, particularly during her “Emily’s D+Evolution” (2016) jazz/pop/rock era.
WILLOW’s own pop/rock/punk/soul explorations from the past few years also inform her current jazz/funk/fusion present (and hopefully future).
The singles released from the LP, “symptom of life” and “bigfeelings”, are the best ambassadors for this tight 12-song offering which literally begins with what sounds like an off-mic Jon Batiste screeching, as if being born, “I love everything!”
(BTW, could Batiste be on more of a roll? He also co-produces and co-writes “Ameriican Requiem”, the opening track on COWBOY CARTER. If I’m an artist, I’m thinkin get this man to help kick off my LP, stat, cuz greatness will surely follow!)
After Batiste, we hear steady rimshots underneath WILLOW’s “ah oo ah ah” breaths until she sings “I live my life” — and I didn’t conjure my previous cosmic music river metaphor out of nowhere as WILLOW then sings “I trust this river to carry me / home” in this mystifyingly captivating LP opener titled “home”.
In the years before hip hop gained a mainstream foothold on the charts, the ’80s provided many of the jams that would ultimately be sampled by rappers – so you can hear some of the underlying inspirations of Notorious B.I.G., Eric B & Rakim, and LL Cool J – along with LL Cool J himself, with the first enormous hip-hop slow jam, “I Need Love.”
