RAVAGE EP REVIEW: REMA IS THE BEST OF HIS GENERATION
Since majestically waltzing onto the ever-boisterous afrobeats tapestry in 2019 with his inimitable spin on the genre that fuses melodic trap, piquant Eastern melodies and contemporary Afropop, Rema has perpetually cemented himself as an iconoclast, with every new project of his portending a new arc for the ever-evolving genre. However, up until his 2021 genre-bending debut album, Rave and Roses — a glistening compendium of saccharine-sweet romantic ballads — he hadn’t quite figured out what he wanted to say, with his early songs being characterized by insouciant debonair, debauchery and very often, unintelligible lyrics. On Are You There, a sublime highlight on Rave and Roses, he alludes to this, singing “People dey talk say na only woman I sabi talk about. So lemme make I just dey talk about am”.
In a tweet made in 2021, he says ‘ “His lyrics are childish” Yes! I’m young fucking let me grow, if I start spitting all the bars now what will spit when I’m 30 years old, I barely write music let me have a collection of experiences and chat real shit from my heart! Many niggas sing about shit they don’t do! ’. Ravage, his latest collection of songs, functions as a coming-of-age moment of sorts. Coasting on the high of serving up the most successful Afrobeats album of all time, Rave & Roses is the first African project to hit one billion streams on Spotify, he’s replete with beaming confidence, pregnant with stories to tell, misconceptions to set straight and anecdotes of his surreal jaunt to the top. Shrouded in a gripping pastiche of red and black — Ravage exists as a punk-inflected afrobeats oeuvre immersed in the eerie ambience of his hometown Benin City.
While Rema’s previous works function as omnibus projects, with each one containing songs expertly curated to satisfy the various arms of his sprawling fanbase, Ravage sees him at his most focused. The EP is both succinct and thematically focused, underpinned by a newfound hubris and the familiar themes of love and sex. He displays a new layer of depth and intentionality with his songwriting and embraces the unabashed inventiveness that enamored the globe. The project especially shines for its preternatural adherence to sonical and thematic balance. While the first half feels heavy under the weight of his personal reflection and diatribes aimed at detractors, the second half sees him return to familiar waters as he offers smutty lyrics and conjures the dreamy glitz that colors Rave and Roses.
Ravage Rema is artfully brazen. A departure from the coy troubadour role he has portrayed since arriving the Afropop scene. On Trouble Maker he sings “How many dues wey the boy don pay? How many insult I go take, ah?”. On the ominous DND, he brags about having too many solo hits and compares himself to Solomon in the Bible. The P-Prime-produced Smooth Criminal is particularly entertaining and embodies the cavalier ethos that upholsters this project. He vacillates between egoistic spiels and playful quips. He jeers at his exes for living boring lives, brags about wearing foreign designers, quips about stealing someone’s girl and enjoins his debtors to make haste in delivering his payment, all on the same track. It almost feels like a Drake-adjacent lament about attaining the pinnacle of superstardom but delivered with a pristine sense of panache.
The last two songs see him in familiar waters —he plays the part of a consummate lover recounting escapades gorged with love, sex and escapism. On Don’t Leave, over swashbuckling drums and tangy synths, he constructs the ultimate romantic fantasia as he showers his muse with praise, brags about taking her from an undeserving guy and brags about how she never wants him to leave. Red Potion, the standout track on the project, is a poignant masterwork immersed in desperate longing and an eerie hollowness. The sumptuous production augments the palpable aura of longing as he bares his deepest horniest desires to his muse.
At just under 15 minutes, Ravage is Rema’s gambit at reinventing himself once again. It’s an exciting transition that reprises his preternatural eclecticism. Too frequently, we see artists lose their proclivity for experimentation after reaching a new peak, deferring to mindless regurgitation at the behest of label execs. But Rema avoids that trap, conjuring never-before-heard sounds as he continues cultivating his mythos through inventive and startling flourishes. On the project, he trades suaveness for rawness and sleek curves for jagged edges, but it’s perhaps his most sophisticated and cavalier work yet. He’s finally blossomed into his most advanced form yet. Every facet of the project gives the sense that he’s upped his tendency for experimentation. There’s just something obscene about seeing an artiste this young with an uncanny level of talent, copious appetite for risk and flawless execution. His growth is evident, his stories have more layers of depth, his melodies are more piquant and his voice is stronger. This EP sets the stage for what’s next and his message is clear: I’m the best of my generation.
