Teyana Taylor — The Album (Review)
The very rare would admit that Teyana Taylor’s previous album K.T.S.E. was the best amongst the collection released during GOOD Music’s Wyoming Sessions. With her new album The Album, she revitalizes that notion of pure consistent excellence.
Teyana’s growth as an artist is matched by the vigor behind her voice. K.T.S.E. came and went leaving an imprint based around consistency, which replicates on The Album.
The Album has a lot of different factors that jump out at you, amongst the plethora of tracks running down. From interesting duets and features to a collection of solo outputs to flex her strengths, Teyana truly does a lot to deliver the best she can. Unfortunately, one of the more intriguing feature combination, albeit a solid track, didn’t match the expectations one expected. “Boomin,” featuring Missy Elliot and Future is that track.
“Boomin” is a smooth and sensationally sexy track, doesn’t justify the Missy Elliot placement. Like “Lady Marmalade” Missy only acts as the introductory emcee at an open mic night. Albeit a non fundamental disappointment, Future’s verse is a holistically natural inclusion.
Most of the features on the album come and feel the same as Future’s, which is a testament to the song construction. If one were to proclaim Quavo could duet and match with someone of Teyana’s caliber, it could be laughed at, but “Let’s Build,” is a testament to anyone thinking otherwise.
Capping at 24 tracks, The Album, could always look to shave some. This more so, with the second half of the album. Albeit being a dominant solo half, there is only so much she can carry on her shoulders. Like “Try Again,” a powerful track about relationships but with a very simple repetitive chorus.
There are times where The Album gets off course, but like “Try Again,” it comes from her weakness in delivering great choruses. It’s as if constantly delivering the same word can be as impactful as making something more Concrete.
But she continues to shine as a lyricist, which she shows more of in the second half of her album. The lush instrumentals vary with a lot of weight to levy it’s dominance and make them individual standouts.
“Made It,” and “We Got Love,” have some of the best production on the album. The instrumentals emboss smooth percussion layers with bombastic approaches through various angles.
The Album continues to prove Teyana is an eventual force to be reckoned with in the music industry.
