Album Review: RAYE, ‘My 21st Century Blues’

Wildly successful DJ collaborations and major songwriting placements for the likes of Beyoncé and John Legend couldn’t save RAYE from the disgusting hellscape that is the music industry — so she saved herself. My 21st Century Blues, her debut solo LP which also doubles as her first body of work as an independent artist, finds RAYE celebrating the fullness of freedom. With the help of executive producer Mike Sabath, RAYE uses the blues to exercise her freedom to sing about topics beyond the scope of a typical frothy pop star, her freedom to name abusers for what they are, and her freedom to convey her artistry in her own way. But these aren’t the canonical blues. Across the album, RAYE uses different sonic motifs from the blues genre to reimagine what that mood looks like in the 21st century. Doleful piano, gritty storytelling, and evocative vocal performances are the backbones of the record. Infused with forays into dance music, boom-bap, garage, and soul, My 21st Century Blues is a sweeping survey of both RAYE’s psyche and all of the trauma, triumph, and perseverance that have kept her grounded in her pursuit to reclaim her independence.

Fittingly, My 21st Century Blues begins in an imagined club of the same name. Throughout the 15-track album, RAYE transforms the club from a seductive jazz lounge to a despondent dancefloor before eventually closing with a pivot to the ungodly hours that connect the sweat of Saturday night with the sacred hours of the Sunday morning. “Oscar Winning Tears,” the first proper song on the album, maintains the theatricality established in “Introduction.” RAYE employs a rap-sung cadence to add some further texture to the song’s bluesy melodic slides. The result is a sound that lands somewhere between a more hip-hop-adjacent Sara Bareilles and the gloomy nostalgia of Amy Winehouse’s tone. It is the final chorus, however, that displays RAYE’s singular songwriting ability; the sputtering start-stop breakdown of the chorus against her rousing belts and grandiose strings and horns make for an outstanding start to the record.

RAYE’s debut album isn’t restricted by its concept. Instead, she finds different ways to reimagine the concept of the blues and her fictitious club across the record. “Hard Out Here” continues the juxtaposition of her resilient vocal performance against ominous boom-bap-inflected production, while “Black Mascara” takes a page from Robyn’s playbook and pairs melancholy lyrics with an irresistible dance beat. RAYE and Mike Sabath’s ability to maintain a throughline of sonic coherence in spite of so many different musical influences is nothing short of impressive. “Escapism,” the U.K. No. 1 hit single, remains a pitch-perfect pop song, effortlessly conveying the grueling realization that escapism is not enough to secure true peace. Once she moves past the inevitable emptiness of escapism, RAYE then gets explicit. “Mary Jane” finds her grappling with pathways to escapism that are truly just vices, “Ice Cream Man” is a harrowing look at the horrors women face in the music industry (her voice here is so earnest it sounds as if she’s singing to herself in the mirror), and “Body Dysmorphia” and “Environmental Anxiety” tackle exactly what their titles suggest. The former utilizes a never-settling and subtly discordant soundscape to reflect the agony of body dysmorphia, and the latter takes on flashes of garage and pop-punk to anchor RAYE’s version of “Earth Song.”

Even amongst its heavier moments, My 21st Century Blues is still an album about freedom. From the disco-tinged flirtatiousness of “Worth It” to the ironic union of the sacred and the secular on “Buss It Down,” a cousin to Beyoncé’s “Church Girl,” RAYE’s debut album makes sure to prioritize the more jovial layers of her pursuit of independence. At times, the album’s momentum stalls with tracks like “Flip a Switch” and “Five Star Hotels.” Nonetheless, moments of literal musical freedom like “The Thrill Is Gone” — which utilizes a funky guitar, bluesy live instrumentation, and a vocal performance that is as raw as it is charismatic —rectify those relatively minor missteps. A terrific body of work and a testament to the power of a strong artist-producer partnership, My 21st Century Blues has set a new standard for pop albums in 2023.

Key Tracks: “Mary Jane” | “Oscar Winning Tears” | “Buss It Down” | “The Thrill Is Gone” | “Ice Cream Man”

Score: 80

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