Twenty88, the collab name chosen by R&B singer Jhené Aiko and rapper Big Sean, dropped their album "Out of Love" on April 1st, and the accompanying 15-minute short film a week later, to largely positive reviews. What earns the greatest praise, and rightfully so, is the amazing chemistry between the two of them. Aiko's soft, melodic voice pairs well with Big Sean's rasp and cadence and their interactions on camera are as great as they are musically. The album itself is short, only 8 tracks long, but within those songs Twenty88 explores a frustrating, obsessive romance that is both entertaining and relatable.
In an interview with Flaunt Magazine, Jhené Aiko said, "Music now doesn’t really cater to the feelings of a real relationship, It’s all about trapping and bragging. I feel like this project is something that’s needed right now". This sentiment clearly shows through in the music. While the album doesn't seem to follow a single narrative, it certainly hits upon a decisive theme: running out of love in a relationship. But even in this relationship filled with resentment and turbulence, there's still love to be found.
Within the songs themselves, Big Sean doesn't indulge the bad habit of bragging that rappers often cannot get rid of, even when rapping about relationships. His honest, engaging verses on this album easily outshine any of his verses that have been played on the radio. As for the other half of Twenty88, Jhené Aiko really delivers and I can't recall a time when she's ever sounded better. Separately, Big Sean and Jhené Aiko are great at producing songs to rip apart an ex, but it's the combination of their two perspectives that adds depth and humanizes the relationship.
The first track on the album "Déjà vu" explores two people returning to a relationship with the same passions and the same issues. Big Sean's verses portray the relationship as fun and sensual, but Aiko's bitterness over feeling played gives the song a different context. Similarly, in "Selfish," if the listener were only given Aiko's verses, the partner she's singing about would seem like an unreasonable, selfish jerk, but the same applies for Big Sean's verses. With both perspectives together, we understand that both parties in the relationship are unhappy about the same thing and believe their partner is selfish, but are unwilling to let up on their own selfish tendencies. Again, this provided a cliché scenario with nuanced depth. In light of all the amazing tracks"Out of Love" has to offer, "Push It," the sex song that fails to be sexy, especially in comparison to "2 Minute Warning" and "On the Way," falls short of the mark.
Beyond the audio, the visuals also add intrigue to "Out of Love." The short film Twenty88released reinforces the album's themes and makes them even more entertaining. The film feature Aiko and Big Sean as adult film stars from the future, which has a 70's aesthetic. Though it sounds odd and slightly left of center, it works well. While most songs from the album are only given in excerpts, "Talk Show" is featured in its entirety and is the best scene in the film. Aiko and Big Sean are on a talk show and, when asked about their relationship, reply that it's wonderful. After Big Sean dedicates a verse to serenade his fictional relationship with Aiko, she completely changes the tone in a few lines (Yeah he's sweet/ I mean you know when he wants to be not all the time). Then, he gloves come off and Big Sean launches full force, because if she's going to call him out, he has a few things to call her out on too. Even though Aiko only has two short verses in the song, her expressions on film are spectacular, and you can tell she and Big Sean had a lot of fun with it.
Whether Twenty88 will produce any more albums in the future is unknown, but one can only hope that they do given the amazing music "Out of Love" features, and the best it brings out in two great artists.
