Brent Faiyaz on Tour
Brent Faiyaz is a thoroughly contemporary R&B star, as interested in the complexities of modern romance as he is the inner workings of the soul, and frequently operating outside the boundaries of any one genre. But he's old-school when it comes to performance. The man's voice is powerfully crisp and emotive whether he's hitting falsettos over a hazy beat or (more often) the live grooves of his three-piece band or a single acoustic guitar. It's easy to see why the Maryland native draws comparisons to '90s R&B stars like Ginuwine, or Slim from 112. And as heard on both his solo albums and especially his work with the trio Sonder (rounded out by producers Dpat and Atu), he's also drawn to the type of lush and percussive beats that Timbaland pioneered. But whether he's singing the hook on GoldLink's Grammy-nominated "Crew" (featured in HBO's Insecure) or stretching out across the 10 tracks of his boldly inventive 2020 album F*ck the World, Faiyaz is also clearly drawn to the woozy, vibey and sometimes introverted feel of auteurs like the Weeknd, Frank Ocean and Miguel.
Brent Faiyaz in Concert
Brent Faiyaz was born in Baltimore-adjacent Columbia, Maryland. Though he was solidly a hip-hop head as a kid, his older brother soon put him onto '90s R&B acts, effectively sealing his fate. His obsession with Jodeci grew even as Faiyaz began making beats and recording raps in his room, almost in defiance of his natural gift for melody. At last, a would-be manager told him what he needed to hear — "just sing" — and Faiyaz shifted gears. He realized that he didn't have to embrace a prepackaged R&B image to succeed as a singer. In 2014, he shared the bracingly vivid and cinematic "Natural Release" on SoundCloud. Around the same time, he quit his grocery store job and spent his tax return to make it to Los Angeles. It proved to be a smart gamble, as a series of singles soon evolved into his hotly tipped A.M. Paradox EP (2016) and roundly celebrated, increasingly personal Sonder Son album (2017), recorded during a monthlong stay in his father's native Domincan Republic. While Faiyaz took some worthy detours — appearing on GoldLink's "Crew," Juice WRLD's Death Race for Love and a handful of Sonder releases — he saved his strongest statement for 2020's F*ck the World which, despite the title, felt deeply warm, inviting, vulnerable and imaginative.
