BTS’ V seems like an outdated soul on the subject of music. Positive, he’s one-seventh of the largest pop group on the planet, who’ve helped push Korean music ahead on a world scale. However, when he shares music suggestions on livestreams, social media and in interviews, he typically chooses to focus on jazz classics and classic R&B staples over artists from his personal technology.
That his debut solo album ‘Layover’ pitches up in that smoky, easy world of yesteryear, then, comes as no shock. The singer’s voice – which is at its goosebump-inducing greatest when its proprietor drops it right into a deeper register that’s mushy and fluffy across the edges – is made for such a mode. V’s compatibility together with his chosen palette makes magic, the document immediately oozing sophistication.
Somewhat than repair his gaze totally on the previous, although, this launch finds V giving these traditional sounds his personal fashionable twist. ‘Wet Days’ opens with a piano melody that transports you into the dimly-lit glow of a jazz bar, the place it may very well be 2023 or 1923. However the ping and zoom of texts flying via the digital ether cuts via inside in seconds, pulling you into the current. ‘Blue’ combines old fashioned R&B with a extra present beat and manufacturing results on snippets of backing vocals that feels without delay timeless but additionally futuristic.
The distinction between intervals may be felt most keenly on ‘For Us’, probably the most fascinating music on ‘Layover’. The pitched-up vocals that usher within the observe don’t serve simply as a mood-setting introduction, however as a tool for a shift and intrigue. After they reappear halfway via, they sign an imminent key change – one which turns into all of the extra impactful for its chipmunk-high preface. The remainder of the observe, although, is deliciously of the previous, its synth pads and vibrant piano instantly harking back to soft-focus ’70s stay performances.
Lyrically, ‘Layover’ is easy and offers largely in relationships which have veered off target, however with V at instances hopeful, others longing (and typically each) that they’ll get again on observe. It is smart. The album’s title refers to a interval of ready – limbo, nearly – on a journey and, right here, the singer is trying to find the connection to the subsequent cease in his life.
“It’s about time we get it straight / Gimme a minute if it ain’t too late,” he instructs on the romantic ‘Sluggish Dancing’. Within the refrain, he gives extra incentive to make the decision. “Possibly we / Might be / Sluggish dancing,” he suggests, voice transferring as glacially and calmly because the exercise he’s proposing. “Till the morning / We may very well be romancing / The night time away.”
‘Love Me Once more’ is extra confrontational. It seems like a dialog – or V rehearsing how one will go in his head. “Is that each one it’s important to say / One phrase, that’s it?” he quizzes at one level, following his interrogation up with a concession and an admission: “Advantageous, I’ll be trustworthy with you / Put all of it on the market / I take into consideration you on a regular basis / The place you might be, who you’re with / Misplaced with out you child.” It’s thrillingly intimate and an actual spotlight of the document.
‘Layover’ has been a very long time coming – over the previous few years, V has teased each songs and a full launch on social media and in interviews, solely to delete his work and begin once more. Lastly – and with assistance from ADOR founder and NewJeans shaper Min Hee-jin – his debut album has survived his robust vetting course of and it’s an attractive hear; one which makes inventive selections quite than business ones (see: the minute-long, meandering flute solo on the finish of ‘Sluggish Dancing’). Maybe V made us look ahead to this one, nevertheless it was totally price it.
Particulars
- Launch date: September 8, 2023
- File label: Huge Hit Music / HYBE
