When I first heard Kai Williams’ new album Dark, I was intrigued. It’s a record that is so much more than what it appears to be on the surface.
By Graeme Smith
As the name suggests, it’s a brooding affair, lingering on the shadowy side of life. Elements of electronic pop melange with trap and R&B, sitting in an intersection between the genres and comfortably traversing them. Much of the lyrical themes you’d expect from those genres are present in the album – heartache, excess, sexuality. In Williams’ hands they are seething and seductive. It’s music for the bedroom, either alone or with someone else.
That is, on first impression.
Delve deeper and Dark is about so much more than lust and luxury. Beneath we get tales of toxic relationships, escape, loneliness, and finding oneself across its thirteen tracks.
The album is introduced by the bass and bombast of Mirror, a reflective early meditation made rich by groovy beats and soft, intimate, digitally enhanced vocals. Its atmosphere and emotion draws us, as listener, in, and from there we are gripped.
Instrumentally, Dark sticks to a familiar throughline – 808s, Reese basses, synths, drums – but the album stands out for the broadness of its lyrical themes. While, for instance, Troublemaker talks of unhealthy obsession, Louis Vuitton, which follows it, speaks of the emptiness of consumerism. Williams goes deep with this album, and it’s all the better for it, setting him apart from those in the game for the fame.
The Pole is a cheeky highlight, telling a smoky tale of falling in love with a stripper. Paralysed contrasts it by feeling expansive, building an image of an urban nightscape. The heartfelt ballad of Yuko sticks with you too through its authentic emotion.
It was Fast Car that stood out the most for me, though. It represents Williams at his rawest, speaking of soul searching and escape. “I’d rather find myself than somebody else,” he declares in the chorus. It’s a powerful thought.
Dark is a shining example of trap done well. Williams has truly injected it with some substance while keeping all the elements that fans of the genre will love. It’s well worth a listen, preferably on headphones in the small hours of the night.
If you want to keep up to date with all Kai Williams is doing, you can follow him on Instagram.
Dark is out now, and you can listen to it below.
