Majid Jordan, the eponymous debut from Toronto duo Majid Al Maskati and Jordan Ullman, is a nighttime cityscape with its dark, warm, atmospheres interjected by hovering buildings and their glow. The record is a veritable mood, stylistically borne of 808s and Heartbreak by Kanye West and House of Balloons by The Weeknd, using their elements to create a bona fide dance record. Majid Jordan succeed most when they embrace their dance inclinations, perpetuating the physicality of sound, but fail hardest when they become pop. Their failure to reconcile their mainstream inclinations and authenticity is symptomatic of a new agenda—audience—and is ultimately what defines this album.
Their vocabulary consists of round, sub-bass kick drums; airy, rippling snares; and atmospheric, tactile instruments, all of which come together to make the contrasting architecture that defines the mood of Majid Jordan. Being left to their own wits, the album was a commercial failure—this was their first substantial work unattached to OVO Sound label-head Drake, and their inability to define their audience ultimately inundates them. Their lack of a singular audience facilitates instances where they desperately call upon disingenuous pop theatre (“Pacifico”), and in others effortlessly succeed with their own off-kilter, spatially-subversive styles (“Every Step Every Way”). The album’s dead weight speaks to the internalised war between the mainstream style and their own in the excessive, questionable percussion of “Shake Shake Shake,” and the longing-but-preachy vocals of “King City.” “Shake Shake Shake” feels like a cheap rework of “Pacifico” which feels like a cheap rework of the preceding “Small Talk,” making for a mundane, repetitive stretch of songs. Not so brilliant. It’s a confusing phenomenon as they demonstrated masterful cohesion on their first EP A Place Like This, but lose it so profoundly in the aforementioned songs.
The style they’ve adopted is one that has proliferated in recent years, an R&B-driven pop that fights atmosphere and tactility. It’s a style that has afforded both the singer the producer a voice, and Majid Jordan’s prowess has been their attention to every millisecond of sound. Their innovation is found within an ability to turn spatial juxtaposition into dialogue, which is ultimately the key to great dance music. They engage their brilliance on massive successes like “Learn From Each Other,” which sees producer and vocalist in conversation, responding and reacting. In cuts like “Something About You,” and “Every Step Every Way,” they really toy with space and texture—the sounds are ephemeral, elusive, and positioned such that they never to give too much, but remain suggestive to listeners. They follow similarly on “Warm,” making disillusioning contrasts of space with haunting melody. The highlights of the album are intensely clever and laden with groove, and their use of the spatial juxtaposition—the fluid atmosphere of instruments, the interjection of percussion—is ultimately what makes this a physical dance record. However, its core brilliance is besieged by a conflicting desire to reach to an audience that isn’t theirs, becoming incredibly frustrating as they reduce their potential to a whisper.
5