Joji, who you may also know as the past controversial YouTuber and internet provocateur Filthy Frank, has just released his 5th album, Nectar, which is the follow up to Ballads 1, on September 25th, 2020.

 After relabeling himself as an artist and distancing himself from the world of Youtube, George Miller joined the record label 88rising with other artists such as Rich Brian and Indonesian singer Niki and became the Joji we know today. Joji showed himself as being capable of a lot more than making vomit cakes and trolling the internet after he began to explore the world of music and the drastic change in persona that PinkGuy fans saw was overwhelming. We got to see the alternative, R&B, semi pop, and overall interesting artist who made music for all moods and talked about real issues instead of watching all of his videos get taken down.

Joji fans finally got to see the long-awaited album after going through many album release delays. The events following up to the album were honestly almost as important as the actual release. The teasers and pre-released songs were hits and incredibly well-produced, but in a way they provided an unrealistic approach to the album. The songs that he chose to pre-release were the hits and because of that the songs that came out with the album just couldn’t compare. This created disappointment since the songs he released prior to the drop were the most well-produced, the rest could only go down.

 We can still see familiarity in Joji’s voice and overall production but this album really highlighted his skill like none of his previous ones. The listener gets told a sad love story full of heartbreak, disappointment, and lack of self-worth. You see this theme throughout the entire album. Joji has incorporated features into his album really well. We can see experimentalists Yves Tumor, Diplo, and Lil Yachty on the album as well and they modify their sound to meet Joji’s aesthetic almost flawlessly. While all the songs have a certain flow to them, I would say some of the changes to a new artist in the songs were not executed the best and seemed abrupt in a way. Joji’s vocal delivery wasn’t short of anything, except for a slight strain during some high notes in “Ew”, but he didn’t seem to take attention away from the features, but rather blend his sound together with theirs.

This album wasn’t just another brainless pop ensemble, but rather a showcase of beautiful instruments like powerful guitar and grand production. The amount of instruments added a vintage feel and smooth segway into the switch-ups in the songs. The instruments helped make the crescendos magical and the sad or moody parts hit the listener so much more. 

The album is incredibly creative and has a variety of sounds throughout the listening experience and the electronic textures help with the variety. We can see a lot of components that Joji wanted to include such as atmospheric ballads that go with the theme of space that really made the songs sound intergalactic. The album is overall incredibly raw and despite the occasional hiccup or awkward moment it was incredibly emotional and i think the elements of lofi, retro, and a feeling of nostalgia make the album really special, I would recommend it to people with wide ranges of taste in music and give it an 8/10.

My Reviews Of A Few Songs: 

“Mr. Hollywood” and “Like You Do” most clearly show the reasoning behind the album by telling the tale of a sad love story filled with heartbreak and disappointment, In Mr. Hollywood we see the story being told in a more fun tempo and lyrics, While Like You Do is much more of a moody song.

“Tick Tock” has a very catchy and interesting sound with solid changes in beat and tempo throughout the song. It stands out and kinda leads the album in a way. 

“Run” is an amazing song and one of his most popular with different variations of tempos and that zig-zag effect where the sounds go back and forth effortlessly. The beautiful guitar solo at the end was simply captivating and the switch-ups are incredibly smooth with combining the intergalactic sounds.

“Pretty Boy” is simply a fun song and while Lil Yachty’s verse was heavily autotuned and kind of odd, it did make the song much more upbeat and fun, he did a good job adapting to Joji’s style in order to fit the song and album. The song is very fun and enjoyable to listen to. This is one of my favorites in the album. 

“777” and “Reanimator” lead as the techno and electronic songs; they have a really unique sound and the switches in sounds were perfectly executed.  

      See a playlist of Joji’s Nectar Album here:

https://open.spotify.com/album/5EzDhyNZuO7kuaABHwbBKX?si=QX2uclCcROCQXm7RrDdOVQ