Back in 2016, we were introduced to an artist from Tucson by the name of Lando Chill when he dropped his debut album for Mello Music Group, For Mark, Your Son. This was followed up in the next two years with two more brilliant albums produced by The Lasso, culminating in one of the best albums of the decade, Black Ego. After that album, The Lasso moved back home to Michigan, and Chill moved on to Los Angeles. The Lasso has released a number of projects since then, but Lando Chill has remained relatively quiet since that time, with only a couple of singles and guest appearances. Now he finally returns with a fully formed project, this time produced by Calvin Valentine, if im being honest.

If you’ve spent the time with Lando Chill’s catalogue, it might take you a second to adjust your ears to this album, if only because of the different approaches between The Lasso and Calvin Valentine. While Lasso might have pushed Chill in a more prog direction, Valentine is bringing Chill into a smoother pop/R&B direction. Neither is better than the other, they are just different styles to hear Chill engage with. That said, if you’ve spent any time with Valentine’s production before, you know this is going to sound good coming through with the volume turned up on your car stereo. Of course, what this all comes down to is Lando Chill on the mic, and you know he has the goods. If I just looked at the title of the opening track, “bitches be wilin,” without knowing anything about Chill, I might expect to hear a simple, misogynist song about how bitches be wilin’, but when you listen to Chill’s song, we quickly dive into layered lyricism about race, class, religion, fashion, and more. It’s incredibly smooth and easy to listen to, but the second you lean into pay closer attention to his pen game, it becomes clear that this is going to be an album you need to listen to several times through before you catch all of the references and observations that Chill can pack into a three minute song. My personal favorite on the album is “Tim Raines,” which takes a simple metaphor referencing one of the all-time great baserunners in MLB history and then rides this incredibly smooth groove while Chill free associates and touches on everything from the prison industrial complex to his hometown of Chicago and beyond.

The beauty of an album like if im being honest is that Lando Chill and Calvin Valentine have put in the work over the years and have such good chemistry together that when they finally dropped this project, they made it sound smooth and effortless, even though it takes a lot of work to make something so easy to listen to and so layered and complex at the same time.