GAYLETTER

‘Cupid Deluxe‘ is a night-time album. It plays like the soundtrack to your 3:00AM cab ride home: your head bouncing drunkenly against the window as the lights of the city whirl by. Songs you just danced to ring in your ears and mingle with the quickly fading memories of your night. The moments of bliss and the moments you missed, the spark of lust or the apathy of disappointment. On his sophomore album Blood Orange, aka Brooklyn-based singer/producer/instrumentalist Devonte Hynes, has diffused this bittersweet feeling into 11 tracks celebrating and commiserating the after-dark world.

As the album cover suggests, Hynes and his many excellent collaborators are unapologetically vulnerable, telling stories about searching for connection and comfort over disco grooves and rippling beats. Chairlift’s Caroline Polachek haunts the album opener “Chamakay” while Samantha Urbani, lead singer of ‘Friends’ and Hynes’ real-life girlfriend, holds her own on introspective duets throughout. Elsewhere, the Dirty Projectors’ David Longstreth flexes his impressive RnB muscles on “No Right Thing” while rappers from England (grime artist Skepta) and Queens’ (Despot) flow with unhurried intensity on lengthy guest spots.

 

But as Blood Orange it’s Hynes himself that holds together the album as a singular vision. Fresh from his star-making turns producing for Solange and Sky Ferreira, he’s able to perfectly orchestrate his guest vocalists while steering the album with his captivating falsetto. Hynes’ distinct voice rises above his shimmering brand of bedroom pop in surprising moments, and takes songs off in unexpected directions. Nowhere is this more evident than on “Uncle Ace,” the superb track that takes its inspiration and title from the nickname New York City’s LGBT homeless teens have for the ACE subway trains they call home on cold winter nights. “Put all you need in me,” sings Hynes, over a disco beat and woodwind cacophony that rolls on like the titular train.

 

His quiet rawness is a stark contrast to the deafening artifice of ARTPOP, another November release that uses retropop, gender-bending and guest vocalists to illuminate heartbreak and lust. ‘Cupid Deluxe‘ may be just as varied in its stories, but in its soft, gossamer sounds and heart-piercing lyrics, it’s a rare album that is truly as entertaining as it is clever.