WeTalkSound’s ‘LOFN 4’ documents all angles to black love [Pulse Album Review]
Without a doubt, LOFN 4 is the best WeTalkSound album yet.
WeTalkSound release fourth installment of, 'LOFN' to mark Valentine's Day 2021. (WeTalkSound)
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Without a doubt, LOFN 4 is the best WeTalkSound album yet. LOFN 3 might have had more instant bangers and shock value records and LOFN 1 might have had that enviable rawness, but ‘LOFN 4’ is mature and balanced. It reflects the growth of the members of WeTalkSound, Nigeria’s largest music community as individuals, as a collective and as creatives.
These days, members of WeTalkSound deliver sex-related topics like adults, and with a conviction that they’ve actually been in some of these situations. There’s also the balance of gender perspectives to a lot of these records and it offers listeners a perspective of the realities, needs, weaknesses, insecurities, excesses and - guilty - pleasures of men and women.
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More importantly, ‘LOFN 4’ is a lesson on the languages, differences and peculiarities of love for men and women, as well as how indulgent we can be.
ALSO READ: WeTalkSound - LOFN 3 [Album Review]
For example, ‘Trouble’ is an interesting take on love from the perspective of an unproblematic man, who just wants to be loved right. Usually, this shade of emotion a woman’s rhetoric.
Mo’Believe sings in Yoruba that, “Mi o ma l’aya akeboje, so don’t bring trouble to me…”
In English means, “I am gentle and simple, don’t bring trouble to me…”
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Three years ago, WeTalkSound would have struggled to pull off the Afrobeat beauty that is ‘Soweto.’ Some might argue that years have increased the number of capable artists on WeTalkSound and they will be right, but it’s still credit to the community that it’s made itself that attractive in the first place.
Kemena, who released one of Nigeria’s most slept-on albums of 2020 absolutely ripped into ‘Soweto’ with the efficient skillset of a veteran songwriter. He even had the adlibs to match his vivid songwriting on the post-chorus.
It might have been the most enigmatic and even the weakest song on the album, but ‘Toxic’ takes on a mature topic, which reflects our reality as young Nigerians.
While sounding like Goldlink, 3rvhmz discusses the unenviable state of falling for an emotionally unavailable woman in a toxic situationship. As much as this album excels on topical resonance, it’s also about the impressive execution of genres.
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When the album does take on proper R&B, ‘Busy’ sees Naya Akanji outshine TiwaDara in the game of soprano/falsetto - sorry, TiwaDara.
Topically, they complement each other with their concept of a conversational role play, and subtle sexual innuendos. That said, Akanji needs to sound more convincing while discussing sex on beats like this. The idea of sex on R&B is make-believe, you gotta sell it.
R&B also births AndreMussic’s short, yet very tentative intention to create coital relationship. He sings in Yoruba, “Je k’a rira l’ale…” In English, that means, “Let’s see each other at night…”
‘O For Orgasm’ means just one thing.
The opening vocal loops and melodies on ‘Fallin’’ will pique anybody’s attention, but the passion and conviction with which Omotayo delivers his helplessness in the face of love ushers in echoes of 2000s R&B mastery.
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Viveeyan discusses a pertinent young Nigerian topic on ‘Love Me Loud.’ Every other day on Twitter, young Nigerians offer rhetorics like, ‘The best kind of love is the loud kind, you’re either ready to show the world how much you love me or you leave me.’
In detail, Viveeyan wants to be loved from the rooftop as she demands, “Love me loud loud loud loud loud, make everybody know… Me I nor dey for undercover…”
She wants open declaration and heartfelt mushiness in the full glare of human optical paparazzi. Sis, that one go hard o…
Almost like a response, Deziire produces the best song on ‘LOFN 4,’ a declaratory R&B gem with high calibre replay value, underscored by piano staccato and defining bass legatos. Deziire’s voice and style pierce through the record with precision and convey his message with needed gentility, meekness and sensuality.
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If he was speaking to a particular woman in this manner, one of them would be pregnant by nightfall… wilfully.
When the album does take the Afro-pop form, Nu Baby and KvY nail the Yoruba-English alternation of amorous declarations on ‘Like Am.’ Nu Baby even brings church, prayers and celestial church lingo into this matter to strengthen his position with the faceless woman. What will a Yoruba man not do or say because of vagina? The dude is lying, sis.
‘Number’ follows a similar pattern to ‘Like Am’ but ‘D.M.W.T’ documents cheating. ‘Distractions’ sees Quizzzy deliver the second-best performance on this album in painstaking detail about using love as a distraction. The ‘Citation’ and ‘Hennessy’ lines are also quite impressive.
Finally, Ignis Brothers will be Ignis Brothers, they’re awesome. Nuff said…
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Final Thoughts
The only real issue with this album relates to its album sequencing, which would have been better as;
Like Am
Soweto
Fallin
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Number
Toxic
Trouble
Love Me Loud
Love You Now
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Busy
Lale
O For Orgasm
Distraction
D.W.M.T
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Lighthouse
This way, the allbum could have told a story from infatuation, to declaration, to love, insecurity, affirmation, sex and roadblocks.
Ratings: /10
• 0-1.9: Flop
• 2.0-3.9: Near fall
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• 4.0-5.9: Average
• 6.0-7.9: Victory
• 8.0-10: Champion
Pulse Rating: /10
Album Sequencing: 1.0/2
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Songwriting, Themes and Delivery: 1.9/2
Production: 1.9/2
Enjoyability and Satisfaction: 1.7/2
Execution: 1.6/2
Total:
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8.1 - Champion
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