Renaissance, A Portal for Joy and the Unique; An Album Review
- chidiakusobi
- Sep 6, 2022
- 13 min read
Welcome to my Renaissance review.
In my previous reviews, I thought I was killing that shit. This time I went harder.
This review is THIQUE. And laden with lyrical references. If you get it, you get it.
And if you don't, well, I'll be stingy with my love 😉.
Let's get into it.
She’s That Girl
Over the past decade, the release of a new Beyoncé project is accompanied by a palpable cultural shift. A reset. No one else changes the game when their digital drops. That's because Beyonce doesn't just release new music. She creates a new cultural center of gravity through which her fans, both casual members and members of the hive, other artists, your favs, and frankly entire industries begin to orbit around.
We witnessed this with the release of "Beyoncé" affectionally dubbed "self-titled", her 5th studio album that birthed the music industry's surprise album release model. We next felt this with "Lemonade", her gorgeous 6th studio album-movie that deftly weaved themes so central to being human and specifically a Black woman, that the album felt like reading Beyonce's personal diary entries. Both those albums, beyond deserving of Album of the Year Grammys' (let's talk about it), were projects, so big, so central, so damn good, they were inescapable magnets that bended pop-culture to Beyonce's vision.
Six years after the release of "Lemonade", here we are again. This time with "Renaissance", Beyonce's 7th solo studio album. Before she released this project, Beyonce was at a point in her career where her stardom, icon-ness, and boundless talent simply could not be argued with. She can do whatever she wanted because in reality who's going to check her? Kelis? We all saw how that went (rest in peace, sis).
So when Beyoncé announced to the world that Renaissance was coming, we eagerly waited to see what new direction and innovation she would bless the culture with. Like she sings on Break My Soul, Bey is back and we're sleeping real good tonight. Always one to out-do herself, our Virgo stunt queen quietly released "Renaissance" on midnight, July 29th, 2022. And once again, Beyoncé reminded the world she really is that girl.
New Foundation, New Salvation
Renaissance in its strict definition means rebirth or revival, typically of artistic expression after a period of cultural stagnation and drought. America struggled through 4 years of the Trump presidency that was punctuated by a once in a hundred year pandemic. Both viruses, Trump and SARS-CoV-2 completely upended the fabric of our society.
The pandemic drove many of us home for months, while sickness, death, and the less talked about feelings of disconnect, loneliness, and struggles with mental health ravaged in the background. Starting in 2016, and definitely in the early 2020s, current events have felt like a slow burning dumpster fire, with many of society's fissures and fault lines exposing themselves bare for all of us to see. Just this year alone, climate crises, inflation, mass shootings, and more have added to that feeling of decay. And for awhile now, it's felt like culture has been devoid of overt oases of joy. Memes help for sure, but memes exist on screens, while in person shared sources of joy remained elusive. Two years into multiple intersecting crises, the need for collective escape has never been greater.
Enter "Renaissance". An album that Beyoncé described was meant to facilitate escape. To inspire people to "release the wiggle." An album that connects people with the enduring central forces of human culture, joy creators themselves: music and dance. The album's lead single, Break My Soul and Beyoncé's 8th number 1 single fuels this central function of the album. The world might feel like cheap spandex that looks a mess, but it won't break our soul. "Renaissance" is new foundation, and by gifting it to us when she did, Beyoncé provides new salvation. How does she do this?
Herein lies the central thesis of my review.
Beyoncé's "Renaissance" saves and facilitates escape with music and traditions that are foundational to Black, queer, Black queer, and femme cultures. Groups that for centuries in America have been marginalized and in response developed art forms that subverted oppressive cultural norms while centering and celebrating the different. The unique. These groups have long practiced creating new foundations for new salvation. "Renaissance" is a sublime, well-studied curation and celebration of those art forms. And in a short amount of time, it's become our new foundation.
And ooooOOOoo it's so good,
It's so good,
It's so good.
It's so good.
It's sooooOOOooooo good.
"All These Songs Sound Good"
Confession: I have not stopped listening to "Renaissance". It is now September 5th, a day after Beyonce's birthday. We're fully in Virgo Season, and I'm still grooving to "Renaissance" like I'm stuck in the middle of the Sahara and the album is a cold glass of alkaline water. We are thirsty! I don't know what our good sis put in this album, but we want it right here, right now! We are cuffed.
I think what makes this album so re-listenable, an album that isn’t just no skips, but rather an album that you can not skip is the sheer expanse and ambition of every song. Imagine "Renaissance" as a gigantic 16-room mansion, with each song representing an elaborate room, the transitions between songs - ornate hallways. Each room has so much to explore. Nooks, crannies, wall art, molding and more all representing the big and small musical details Beyoncé embedded in each song.
Some songs, like Energy are really three songs in one, while other songs, like Virgo's Groove have the most intricate, gorgeous harmonies, which feel like Beyoncé is taunting us with her ability to out-sing, out-harmonize, out-groove any pop girl in the industry (I don't even know why these girls bother at this point). Because every single song has triumphant moments of auditory excellence, we listen to the album on repeat to discover and re-discover, live and re-live those 10, 10, 10 across the board moments.
Since this is a thique review, let's get into some of the '10, 10, 10' moments across the album. Note, this is not an expansive list. Truthfully, every song on this album can have its own mini-podcast and review. All Up In Your Mind alone has spawned a new epoch in my life.
Philosopher Beyoncé once sang - you know you're that b*tch when you cause all this conversation. So let's get to conversing. First point - the music.
I’m That Girl
A song that once you listen to the album in full, its complete badassery comes to life. Beyoncé purrs “you know all these songs sound good”. And after your 2nd listen (3rd max) - you can’t help but respond with "girl, you right!" The song's tempo is alluring. It starts slow, speeds up, slows down, speeds up again. It keeps you on your toes. This is the most experimental album opener for Beyoncé and it firmly puts the listener in the “oh we about to be f*cked up" mood. I’m That Girl. What an opener. What a fact.
Alien Superstar
This song is straight crack cocaine for the bad bitches of the world. In truth, Alien Superstar is 3 songs mashed into one cosmic sounding orgasm. I love how Beyoncé experiments with various production styles. She has heavy drums juxtaposed with outer worldly electronic synths, mixed with interpolations of the classic 80s song I'm Too Sexy. Vocally? It's perfectly everything, everywhere, all at once. Beyoncé sings, soothes, raps. She recites poetry over a plush beat, then ends with spoken word. Sometimes she spells the word unique. Other times, she randomly yells UNIQUE! How this sonic explosion works is a covenant between Beyoncé and God.
Later in the review, I discuss the significance of Alien Superstar as it relates to the central goal and emotional core of "Renaissance". Till then, in short Alien Superstar is a song that sounds nothing like we've heard on the radio or will hear. This is Beyoncé birthing a vibe. The song calls in your baddest, most confident self. And then elevates that self to the stars. Reminding us that we are the bar. The Alien Superstar.
'Cuff It' to 'Energy' to 'Break My Soul' Transition
Phew! This stretch of the album is pure honey. How do you go from Cuff It, a 70s inspired BOP that ends with gorgeous horns and guitar riffs to Energy, an Afro-beat and trap-disco Banger, to Break My Soul, a 90s house meets New Orleans bounce dance-pop moment and have all three songs effortlessly blend into each other? It's not right, nor is it okay, but we're going to keep dancing anyway. At this point, the album feels like a masterfully curated DJ set that deliciously weaves through songs with fire transitions that aren't obvious to make, but when completed, all you want is for the DJ to play it again! And so it happens again, because the DJ is you. And you are playing the album on repeat. #Cuffed
Virgo’s Groove
The WHOLE track. Front to back. A 6 minute and 8 second long song that by the end you don't want to end. Imagine that. The falsetto. The runs. The harmonies. The registers she surfs up and down like it’s a mild Olympic day. This is Beyoncé letting the girls know, again that she is one of one, in fact the only one. I've never heard an artist sing a single line "You're the love of my life" in all the intricate ways that convey the complexities of love: the longing, bliss, desire, and desperation. It's all there in the notes. Virgo's Groove is a vocal tour de force. Virgos everywhere, say hello to your new anthem.
Move
"MOVE out the way. I'm with my girls and we all need space."
An opener. A movement (pun intended). A mood.
That is all.
Heated
One thing about Beyoncé - she sings lyrics that immediately become pop culture canon. Especially in Black, queer, and Black queer spaces. "Renaissance" not surprisingly is chock full of them. To the point where one could consider "Renaissance" an essential tome, with each song representing a Book, like the Bible. If this were the case, the magnificent, technically and spiritually excellent house bop that is Heated would be Proverbs. Besides having a danceable-af beat, produced by the Certified Lover Boy himself, Drake, lyrically the song is filled with quintessential "Renaissance" energy. The limit of Bad Bitchery does not exist.
And then the outro comes in.
2 words: Lyrical Devastation.
Just when you thought nothing could compete with Alien Superstar, Heated comes in and eats the girlies completely up. The outro is where Heated soars. She adopts the voice, cadence, and bravado of ballroom announcers. And Beyoncé naturally bodies this role while spouting instantly quotable one-liners. These are my favorite ones and high-key future IG captions.
Lines:
"Only the radio can play me"
"I'm just as petty as you arrRRrrreee"
"Face card never declines, my God!"
“Drinking my water, minding my biz."
"Monday I’m overrated, Tuesday on my d*ck”
And the immediately classic:
"Uncle Johnny made my dress. That cheap spandex she looks a mess."
Cheers to Uncle Johnny, Beyonce's gay uncle, for being the inspiration and energy behind Renaissance. And congratulations on becoming the most iconic uncle.
"Fingertips go tap tap tap on my MPC making disco-trap"
"Renaissance" is an album that transcends Space and Time.
And by doing so, "Renaissance" is an Afro-Futurist record without ever having to explicitly state it is. You feel it in the energy the album creates when it's played in spaces where people have gathered, especially Black and queer people.
"Renaissance" inspires release and the feeling of possibility. It evokes the feeling of traveling to the past to carry forward with us the magic of those who have come before us. Sankofa. A word from the Twi language in Ghana that means "to go back and fetch". Beyoncé does this by tapping into Black music over the past 40 years and blending those genres with present-day ones. The result are songs that sound fresh. She explicitly tells listeners she's doing this on Heated when she announces "fingertips go tap tap tap, on my MPC making disco-trap."
Disco and trap? Together? This is the energy we didn't know we needed.
How does she do it?
"Renaissance" is a dance record that ambitiously and expertly juxtaposes genres that cross multiple decades and disparate locations. For many artists, attempting such a feat would sound like a mess, but on "Renaissance" the result is creative genius. For example, on Break My Soul Beyoncé connects house music pioneered by gay Black men in Chicago in the late 80s/early 90s, with Bounce, a dance genre from the 2000s that originated in New Orleans and was pioneered by Black queer artists, chief among them Big Freedia.
When you listen to Break My Soul, you're hearing 1980s/1990s House mixed with 2020s Bounce, and the result is a song that feels both familiar and entirely new. Break My Soul is a song born out of Black queer cultures separated by time and place, yet bonded in the joy of liberation and possibility. That is Afro-Futurism.
Take the next track, Church Girl. Another song that expertly plays with space and time. Church Girl starts with a sample from Center Thy Will, a 1980s song from the gospel trio 'The Clark Sisters.' When the song starts the sample, the piano, and Beyonce's gospel style singing transports you to a Black church. And you're fully in it, feeling the spiritual energy. Then 25 seconds into the song, the beat drops and BOOM!
You're listening to a fierce trap club beat, and you're now teleported into a 2020s sweaty club and loving it. And still, the first verse of Church Girl is a straight up testimony. Beyoncé letting us know that we can do both, that we can contain multitudes. The ending lyrics of the first verse embody this juxtaposition.
Lyrics
"As soon as I get in this party, I'm going to let go of this body.
I'm going to love on me.
Nobody can judge me, but me.
I was born free.
Drop it like a thotty"
Take a second to appreciate that Beyoncé is giving you church testimony in club, telling you to embrace all that you are, that you were born free, and then immediately instructs you to drop it like a thotty.
Beyoncé, you bad for this one. Juxtaposing church testimony with club liberation. 1980s Gospel with 2020s Trap. And doing so like they were always meant to be in conversation with each other. And in case you don't believe this is the song's central premise, Beyoncé ends the track with gospel hymns while singing the lyrics:
"I ain't trying to hurt nobody,
Trying to bring the life up in your body."
Mission Accomplished Sis.
We have been centered in thy will.
Perhaps the best example of "Renaissance" being an album transcending space and time is the final track, Summer Renaissance the song that I describe as the album's spiritual center. Summer Renaissance samples Donna Summer's 1970's hit I Feel Love over a plush disco beat with sultry vocals. Together, this works to make the song feel like you're having the loveliest of acid trips in a forest, sometime in the summer of 1976 with LED lights flashing all around you.
Beyoncé does her signature rap-singing over the beat, making the song feel distinctly modern while also switching it up on us by singing these large ascending and then descending disco diva notes as she sing-moans "it's so good, it's so good, it's so good" (Yes Beyoncé, this song is so good, you gangster motherf*cker!).
I’ve never heard a song that instantly transports you to the past while firmly planting you in the present. Like Schrödinger's cat, existing in both times simultaneously, Summer Renaissance is a disco trap. I argue the porousness of space and time that Summer Renaissance evokes, the portal Beyoncé creates for listeners to escape - that's Afro-futurism come to life.
Finally, I have to mention that the outro of Summer Renaissance and thus the album itself is slick and smart af. Beyoncé low key breaks the fourth wall and it's perfect. She sings “applause. A round of applause" (yes for herself and this album) then states "collect your coins Bee-yon-cee" (she sure did and will with the album sales and tour). Finally she raps "I'm in my bag, bag, bag, bag" (she is absolutely, 100%, correct. You are in your Teflar imported bag sis).
Then Summer Renaissance's outro commences in earnest, which feels like the musical portal slowly closing as you travel back to your world, the outro gently landing you safely on the ground after you've embarked on a journey that by the end has left you totally renaissanced.
And since the album is on repeat, I'm That Girl starts again and you're once again entering the "Renaissance" portal! I'll say it again, #Cuffed
🗣U N I Q U E
To Be or To Be an Alien Superstar.
What happens when an underground cultural art form that was created to subvert a dominant and oppressive culture takes center stage? Does it slay with the ferocity of a thousand suns? Or does it permeate knowing its impact can not be undone?
The answer is yes.
Alien Superstar is one of Beyonce's most experimental songs ever. The entire 3 minutes and 35 seconds feels like a perfectly hand-polished diamond gifted from the Goddess of Bad Bitches and spiritual ancestor of Beyoncé, her first disciple. Anyone gifted this diamond ascends to the next level of self-confidence, self-love, self-do not even waste your time trying to compete with me - energy. The song is a standout track with alluring and seductive production. I love it. But to end the review, I want to reflect on what this song represents, why so many people connect with it, and why Alien Superstar is the emotional core of "Renaissance".
I imagine Alien Superstar as a metaphorical stage, where anyone listening to it is compelled to take its center. The opening lyrics "I'm one of one. I'm number one. I'm the only one" is an invitation for listeners to be the main character, shoot the only character onstage. That is why so many people connect to this song and why I personally connect to this song. If there's any aspect of your identity that is not celebrated or is marginalized by the mainstream, this song unapologetically says you are the bar. Different, outer-wordly, unique, and a superstar all at the same time.
The outro of Alien Superstar drives this very point home. We hear words from Barbara Ann Teer, founder of Harlem's National Black Theatre.
We dress a certain way, we walk a certain way
We talk a certain way, we-we paint a certain way
We-we make love a certain way, you know
All of these things we do in a different
Unique, specific way that is personally ours
To be unique and own it. Celebrate it. And take up space with it.
That is how you Alien Superstar.
At its core, "Renaissance" is a portal for joy and for the unique
Beyoncé made an album for people to unapologetically center themselves. She made an album where people can feel themselves. Be themselves. And importantly do so in community with others. Beyoncé created a portal of joy by providing space for all of us, the unique, to simply be happy, dance, and be born free. And she did so using the music, cultural expressions, and references of Black queer people whose traditions are steeped in liberation.
So what happens when we show up 100% ourselves, confident, and free? Our potentials are unleashed. Supernatural love permeates the air. And the soil for our growth, our souls, is revived, replenished, and renaissanced.
For this album, I won't be stingy with my love:
"Renaissance." You are one bad bitch. You are the bar.
UNIQUELY,
Dr. Chidi Akusobi, MD, PhD
PS: If you like this review, please share widely!
Also check out my other music, movie, and book reviews below!
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Nice for What Review: Hitting Them Angles and Drake's Quest to Conquer Our Heart
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