After months of pushback from his label, Jacquees finally released his highly anticipated sophomore album, “King of R&B.”
As an artist who began his journey pre-streaming era, Jacquees has smoothly adapted to the social media age and capitalizes on the power of the internet time and time again. For example, the title “King of R&B” comes from a video he posted online back in 2018 that sent the culture into a frenzy. On the album is a song called “EEeee” featuring TK Kravitz, facetiously addressing the internet joke about him loving this particular run.
King of R&B, however, is not a joke. At 18 songs and 58 minutes, Jacquees gave us an exceptional, full-sounding album, that solidifies his place in front of this R&B generation.
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The intro track, “King,” has a very appropriate feature from the King of the South, T.I. Jacquees makes a dedication to all the Kings that have come before him and speaks on his journey in life and music thus far. T.I. adds a decent verse, but I wish he would’ve given lyrics more relevant to the topic at hand.
The album features more of Atlanta’s most prominent artists, from big names like Future and Quavo, to up-and-coming rappers like Lil Keed and Lil Gotit. Jacquees maintains his ability to intertwine Hip Hop and R&B like no other, with songs like his single “Verify” featuring Young Thug and Gunna, and another standout, “New New”.
“Never Say Goodbye” gives you that sincere R&B essence, with the hook “It’s hard to say I’ll never see you again…” And his feature from FYB on “Come Get It” serves a modern R&B group vibe that I would like to hear more of. I would have been interested in a Summer Walker (also a feature) style project, with shorter songs and overall shorter run time. But with a name like King of R&B, I’m sure he wouldn’t have felt comfortable going totally against the classic R&B style of a lengthier project.
As far as radio records, the album is packed with them. The last song, “Your Peace”, featuring Lil Baby is a single that took over airwave. The video has now racked up over 28 million views on Youtube. I specifically see his “Warning” track doing well on West Coast stations, which is another nod to him and his team’s strategy of marketability. Another positive for this project is that it sounds extremely original, which is refreshing. No samples, remixes, or covers. All brand new vibes.
So is the album appropriately titled? Did he take the crown with this project? Does it have playback value?
Fortunately, Jacquees is still young, so he has plenty of time to continue growing his discography to back up his claim as an r&b king. In order to unquestionably seize that crown though, I think Jacquees will have to step further away from his Hip Hop inspirations. The signer really needs to take us into a deeper emotional space for an entire project, with big-name – or even small but talented – R&B/Soul features.
I do believe this album was a great representation of his talents and efforts. However, I don’t believe he completely hit the mark to silence his critics. He did step up to the plate in a major way, considering how much was stacked against him. Overall, it is an impressive album with a high amount of playback value.
Here is a short playlist of a few of my favorite songs from “King of R&B.”