Album of the Week: Circles — Mac Miller
Mac Miller’s death in 2018 left an emptiness in the hip hop community. The post-humous counterpart to Swimming (“Swimming in Circles”), Circles, is both a send-off and a heart-wrenching celebration of the artist. Ed Smith tells us why.
Malcolm James McCormick, known better as Mac Miller, died on September the 7th 2018. He had just released his fifth studio album, Swimming, the month prior and was getting ready to embark on the album’s worldwide tour. His death came as a shock to the music community but was sadly not a surprise. With issues of mental health and drug addiction apparent in the years prior, news of an overdose now seemed inevitable. A year and a half removed from his death, Jon Biron, a producer who worked very closely with Mac Miller, has taken it upon himself to complete Mac’s Vision for the album ‘Circles’.
Posthumous releases like ‘Circles’ should always be approached with an air of caution. The death of XXXTentacion can be seen as how not to handle an artist’s unreleased material, unfinished at the time of their death. His two posthumous albums ‘Skins’ and ‘Bad Vibes Forever’ are, to put it bluntly, awful. They were never meant to be released — and never should have been. Scraps of material have been stretched so thinly, creating a lifeless puppet of the late rapper to exchange any and all goodwill for money. Similar fates have befallen other artists in the past such as Tupac Shakur and Michael Jackson. This project, ‘Circles’ answeres the question of whether Mac Miller will suffer the same fate.
Not only is his memory not tarnished by this release, but it also reaches new heights that he touched upon in his lifetime. It’s an airy, downbeat record with deeply personal lyrics which helps us get a real feel for how Miller was coping in the days and weeks before his death. ‘Complicated’ is a reference for what’s to come in the record. On this record, Mac is more content singing over lo-fi beats instead of rapping; it beautifully melds live and synthetic sounds. He sings about the frustrations of daily life and need to take things one at a time, out of fear of them getting to overwhelming: ‘I try, but I can’t clean up this mess made/ ‘Fore I start to think about the future/ First, can I please get through the day?’
‘Blue World’ features a glitchy, hypnotic beat created from vocal samples which have been processed to oblivion. It is easily the most accessible and fun song on the album. Mac is properly grooving on this track, repeating the refrain ‘Don’t trip’ over instrumentals with a carefree delivery. He’s slightly above all of his problems: ‘The devil on my doorstep/ Looking so shady/ Don’t trip, we don’t gotta let him in’. There is little progression through this track; Jon Biron instead opts to riff on a vibe for 3 minutes which, when it sounds as good as this, you can’t really complain.
However, it is a deeply sad record — though it's far more downbeat than any of his other projects, there’s a heart-wrenching glint of optimism to every track. The crowning jewel of these feelings is lead single ‘Good News’. The violin plucks at the beginning are beautiful and set the bittersweet feeling that bleeds throughout this track. Lyrics such as ‘just so tired of being tired’, ‘cards in my hand, but I hate dealing’ give a very poignant look into Miller’s mindset. The slow build-up of instrumentation throughout this track is beautiful to listen to, the airy and carefree is a great contrast to Miller’s mid-range croon. Just like on all tracks, it’s perfect at conveying the tiredness of the lyrics.
‘Everybody’ is a cover of Arthur Lee’s ‘Everybody’s Gotta Live’. It fits perfectly in the middle of the tracklisting, as the themes tackled in this track mirror those throughout the album; Mac puts his own stamp on it in such a way that it may as well be his own song. The drums have been questionably mixed though, sitting uncomfortably at the forefront, significantly louder than the rest of the instrumentation.
Throughout this album, the performances are uniformly immaculate, as Mac tackles mental health issues through lyrical and productive exposition. ‘Hand Me Downs’ is a strong example of this, as the simple guitar and drum beat is built up through the track. Miller demonstrates the prowess of his rap-singing with a great melodic flow that could probably teach Drake a thing or two. ‘That’s on Me’ is yet another standout track, with it’s sweet, waltzing piano accompaniment.
The tracklist builds a soundscape that helps you experience the same headspace Miller was in, in the months prior to his death. Its dreamlike quality is formed through the maintenance of sustained empty spaces. While the spaciness may put off some listeners, it is a real plus to me. It always feels like you are floating a foot or two off of the ground; through it, you feel slightly disconnected. It’s clear that Mac is not in a trance-like state, but definitely he’s certainly not with it either. This perfectly complements the meditative lyrics, which wax poetic over love, death, depression and drugs. Whilst this may seem like typical fare for an RnB record of this style, his emphasis on the despondent side of these elements, not to mention his recent passing, set it on a higher level to his contemporaries.
A gripe, more of a half gripe, I have with this record is the repetition of lyrics. Various metaphors are seen repeated throughout the tracklist, like a depressing Where’s Wally. Mac mentions ‘Floating around like there’s no ground’ numerous times, ‘Where are you going, can I come too’ is a frequent feature. It’s only a minor problem in my eyes as the flow is always switched up and the theme of running in ‘circles’ encourages repetition. It’s just the recycled nature of this songwriting that sits badly with me regardless.
Accusations of giving this record a high score because of his death would be completely sound. But I don’t see this as a bad thing. His passing has put more weight behind every lyric, every beat and note on this project, like Biggie’s Life After Death or Aaliyah’s I Care 4 U. To ignore it would be impossible as this context is so deeply woven into this project. He comes off as a man who feels too old for this world and not long for it, and the fact that this brought about his end is all the more heart-breaking. The grief and sadness in this are palpable and the fact that we, as an audience, know there was no resolution, makes it far more difficult to listen to. There is also an optimism to this project, it shows a man still with hope that things still can get better. This is a brilliant epilogue to his musical journey, it’s a shame it had to end so soon.
Score: 9/10
Did you enjoy this article? Be sure to let us know! Follow us, leave a comment, share, or use the ‘applause’ function here on Medium.
If you’d like to cast a vote in the Album of the Week poll, don’t forget to follow our Twitter. We’ll also keep you posted on all our latest reviews, interviews, and radio shows.
