Toronto duo dvsn’s debut Sept. 5 is R&B blown up to Wagnerian proportions, an unapologetically massive spectacle that reminds us not only of what R&B can do as a form, but what maximalism can accomplish as an approach.
The ten songs here are all pretty simple. There’s nothing here that wouldn’t be considered purist in the nineties; in fact, most of the music here feels closer to, say, Boyz II Men than anything else from the Toronto R&B scene from whence the duo came. And all of the ten tracks here follow tried-and-true R&B formulas – love songs (“The Line,” “Too Deep”), breakup songs (“Hallucinations”), stripper ballads (“Do It Well”) and sex jams (“With Me”).
The difference is in scale. Nineteen85, the producer half of the duo (you may know him from Drake’s “Hotline Bling”), slathers every inch of the sonic playing field with gospel choirs, horns, orchestras and titanic trap drums. Above it all, singer Daniel Daley belts for dear life; whether he’s grieving for a lost lover or simply throwing money in the air at the club, he sounds like he’s on bended knee in the face of God. It’s an approach that makes the simple truths about which Daley sings – love, lust, faith, sadness, longing – feel divine, mythical, apocalyptic.
This all comes to a head on “The Line,” a seven-minute slow-burn that starts with just Daley and a piano before swelling to a “Hey Jude”-worthy gospel coda. (Nineteen85 likes to start songs this way; he uses the same trick on “Angela” and Drake’s “Too Much.”) In a nice trick of sequencing, “The Line” also features Daley’s most ragged vocal performance. Though the vocal takes here were likely recorded months apart, the climactic placement of “The Line” creates the illusion that he’s expended so much energy over the last nine songs that he can barely get through this one.
By the end of this thing, the listener’s likely to be just as exhausted. Sept. 5 is maybe three songs too long, and I’d argue that cutting a few tracks out would better emphasize the scale of the songs that remain. Some of pop music’s great maximalist statements – Pink Floyd’s Meddle, Joanna Newsom’s Ys, James Brown’s Live At The Apollo, Isaac Hayes’ Hot Buttered Soul – have been short, or divided their epicness over fewer tracks. But by the time “The Line” swallows you up and spits you out, it’s hard to complain. After an experience this emotionally arduous, you might even come out feeling refreshed.
Listen to “With Me” from dvsn below.