The title of SZA’s long-awaited “SOS Deluxe: Lana” appears designed to handle expectations: Regardless of her feedback earlier this 12 months that the much-delayed challenge can be a set of latest materials, she appears to have reverted to her unique plan of creating it “outtakes from ‘SOS’ and a few new songs,” as she described it to Selection in August of 2023.
Consequently, it’s just like the deluxe version of her 2017 full-length debut “Ctrl”: a low-key however satisfying assortment outtakes from the album’s classes and varied different tracks which were floating across the web for the previous couple of years, with a few apparently new songs thrown in. It’s clearly not the following chapter of her musical evolution, regardless of her forthcoming tour with Kendrick Lamar and the brand new imagery (horny bugs!) that accompanies it. Anybody looking for one other culture-shaking tune like “Kill Invoice” gained’t discover it right here, however there’s loads to maintain followers comfortable till that subsequent period arrives (which is likely to be some time: 5 years handed between the discharge of “Ctrl” and “SOS”).
So with that context, what treasures are inside “Lana”’s 15 tracks? A lot, though curiously, lots of the greatest songs are towards the top. There are many gentler, “Snooze”-ish grooves and softly strummed electrical guitars; the lyrics are largely about unrequited or unsatisfying love (though there’s loads of intercourse), and, as ordinary, flashes of revenge and perseverance. Essentially the most “woah!” lyric is definitely within the chill present single, “Drive”: “I can’t lose my focus, I do know if hope is the objective / Then I can’t succumb like these cum-guzzlers in any respect.”
Different highlights embrace “Crybaby,” which has a beautiful, lilting refrain and a hovering soprano verse on the finish and simply may have match on “SOS” (though its similarity to different tracks on the album would be the purpose it was left off). “BMF” — a.okay.a. the broadly leaked tune “Boy From South Detroit” — interpolates the melody from Anton Jobim’s “Lady From Ipanema” and consists of the traditional like “I can’t hold my panties from dropping, he’s so fly”; “Kitchen” is a stunning lilting ballad. The closing monitor, “Saturn” — launched again in February — might be essentially the most totally realized tune right here, with a plinking hook and certainly one of her traditional mellifluous melodies.
The headline-grabber is the duet with Lamar, “30 for 30,” though it’s truly not one of many strongest tracks right here: He turns in some strong verses (has he written any sub-par lyrics within the final decade?), however it truly appears like a late-period Mary J. Blige monitor; the 2 songs that includes SZA on Lamar’s newest album “GNX” are a lot stronger. And regardless of its promising title and uncharacteristic type, “Scorsese Child Daddy” doesn’t really feel fairly totally realized.
Not that there’s something to complain about — 15 new SZA songs simply earlier than the vacation is a welcome addition to her catalog and clears the decks for her subsequent period.
