"Boo'd Up" was so popular and long-lasting that
Ella Mai will likely be instantly associated with that throwback slow jam forever, but six of her other singles went either gold or platinum -- or silver in her native U.K. -- by the time she released her second album,
Heart on My Sleeve. Making this set seem even less like a pressure-cooked follow-up is that it contains a single that preceded it by over a year and a half, and it's not presented as anything other than what it is -- no contrivances about having made something that represents her true self, or whatever. Still working closely with
Mustard,
Ella also welcomes other producers such as
Boi-1da,
D'Mile,
Harmony Samuels, and
Jahaan Sweet into her circle, expanding her sound with an apparent disinclination to make trap-styled R&B, yet still with a preference for spacey slow jams and lingering ballads.
Heart on My Sleeve as a title indicates that
Ella is writing a little more openly than before. That's the case here, and it's almost as if the phrase was her directive as she stockpiled material. Lead single "Not Another Love Song" proved to be an accurate indicator of the album as a whole, with
Ella relishing contact with her partner but starting with "I don't wanna mess this up" and later using water metaphors to convey that she's overwhelmed. In second single "DFMU" ("don't fuck me up"), she's skeptical and demands clarification, "Fairy tales, I'm not used to them at all," leading to "'Cause if it's love, I wanna drown," sung with her subtle if distinct vibrato. There's little variation in tempo across the hour-long sequence, but slow and low is undeniably the singer's forte. ~ Andy Kellman
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