Brent Faiyaz: R&B’s Enigmatic Villain Redefining Cool

Frontline’s Niall Smith takes a deep dive into Brent Faiyaz’s latest album, Wasteland, its themes, and the rapper-turned-singer’s transition into an R&B superstar.

They say a story is only as good as its villain, right? Whether it’s the space-age tale of Jedi vs Sith, cops vs robbers or contemporary comic books depicting Batman battling The Joker – we as a culture find ourselves captivated by morally ambiguous figures.

For the longest time, contemporary R&B didn’t have a de facto antagonist. In the early 1980s, boy bands like New Edition sang sickly sweet tunes of love and devotion, and their mature counterparts (George Benson, Keith Sweat, Soul II Soul) churned out tales of PG-rated sensuality and romance.

Of course, there were a few outliers who adopted the ‘bad boy’ image like Bobby Brown. However, in the cases of people like Brown or his 1990s/Y2K counterparts like Usher, Tony Thompson and Jodeci, their tenure as R&B deviants resembled the mould of an anti-hero more than anything else.

But why does it matter? Hip hop music largely engulfed the R&B scene by 1994 as the New Jack Swing era was phased out. In its place, record label executives and A&Rs looked to market a more rogue, hip hop-infused crop of artists to the masses (Adina Howard, Sisqó, Ginuwine). This new brand of hip hop-adjacent R&B resulted in hits like Howard’s Freak Like Me, and Montell Jordan’s This Is How We Do It.

It wasn’t until The Weeknd’s debut 2011 project, House of Balloons, that the R&B scene saw a seismic reinvention. For the first time, the womanising demeanour of Bobby Brown was paired with a voice capable of matching that of a Raphael Saadiq.

Although the world was introduced to the titular crooner on GoldLink’s 2016 viral ear worm Crew; Christopher Brent Wood’s musical ancestry can be traced back to the early 2010s.

The ‘Brent Faiyaz’ moniker wasn’t always the mask worn by the R&B singer we know and love today: Brent Faiyaz’s first two musical outings were heavily rap-focused.

Released in March 2013, Sunset Avenue LP saw a developing Faiyaz rhyme introspective bars over airy, synth-backed production. While little is known about the project (and much of the blog coverage and download links are dead as of 2022), the project has been fortunately resurrected on SoundCloud for die-hard fans to check out.

Sunset Avenue showed promise with its heady, Take Care-era Drake rhymes, ‘90s R&B samples and alleged self-production, but Faiyaz leapt towards artistic growth with his sophomore project, Black Child, backed by his collective Lost Kids.

Released in December 2013, the Black Child EP saw Faiyaz resemble a modern version of himself. Retaining much of its predecessor’s DIY, voice note-quality aura, Black Child featured a lone guest appearance from fellow Lost Kids member Tre’ Amani on EP closer, Successors.

Kitted out with better mixing, sharper instrumental choices and chilling raps, sounding like they were recorded on a shadowy night bus, the nine-track project was Faiyaz’s first true victory as a musician.

Cuts like the Jon B-sampling Down Forever sound like a formative version of Bryson Tiller’s T R A P S O U L with its soul-crushing talking points and toxic mental counter-attacks aimed at the song’s femme fatale. The villain’s origin story continues to unfold…

What’s most interesting about Faiyaz’s rapping tenure is that he was pretty damn good – even by 2022 standards. It’s all too easy to forget the flash-in-the-pan pop-rap from this era, and Black Child is refreshingly dark, even with its sometimes pretentious interludes.

Faiyaz also debuted his singing on the stoic, Miguel-inspired Love Thing and the eight-minute double act City Lights / Worst In Us, indicative of Faiyaz’s forthcoming musical transition.

January 2015 saw the Maryland singer share his first official single, Allure, on digital streaming platforms. The self-produced indie-leaning cut saw Faiyaz almost completely retire his rapping skills in favour of spacey R&B psychedelia.

Around this time, Faiyaz began working with record producers Dpat and Atu more frequently, causing the three parties to form the R&B band Sonder in 2016.

Brent Faiyaz’s toxic crown bestowed upon him today was still floating in the atmosphere around this time. Yet, his music with Sonder retained many reflective glacial qualities found in his old rapping notebook. This time, however, Faiyaz’s music was supported by a bed of harmonious vocal riffs and fewer first-person tales of apathy (for now, anyway).

Most of his career post-2016 has been well-documented, thanks to the aforementioned feature on GoldLink and Shy Glizzy’s Crew (Sonder Son, the Fuck the World saga and his viral TikTok-approved Lost Souls verse etc.), so it’s time to fast-forward to this year’s highly-anticipated LP Wasteland.

Clocking in at a dense 19 tracks, Wasteland hosts guest contributions from numerous beatmakers and artists alike, including Drake, Jorja Smith, The Neptunes, Steve Lacy, Tyler, the Creator, Alicia Keys, Tre’ Amani and Joony, to name a few.

Musically, the album balances throwback ‘90s neo-soul vocals with brittle post-trap 808 drums, snares and kicks. Thematically, the album is centred around his relationship with his baby-to-be’s mother and the revolving wheel of women and vices in his life.

Tracks like the upbeat Addictions, emotionally unconcerned Wasting Time, and vocally stellar Price of Fame are pillars in the LP’s core construct, closely following the overarching narrative and themes.

The record crescendos with the final skit, Wake Up Call and the closing epilogue, Angel, which see the singer’s reckless life of infidelity catch up to him in a fiery blaze of destruction – leaving things open to interpretation as to whether Faiyaz’s pregnant partner, himself or both characters die in the end. Pretty dark, right?

Faiyaz’s decision to centre Wasteland on toxic masculinity and the pitfalls of fame was cunning. The past 24 months have seen the artist garner high praise from all corners of the music sphere for his nonchalant ‘give no fucks attitude’.

Of course, no one is really Brent Faiyaz, not even Brent Faiyaz. The man behind the voice is Christopher. His previous record, Fuck the World, saw the artist revel in so much toxic behaviour and narcissism that he sounded weary of the chaos he created.

Wasteland has a more satirical undercurrent. The album is a cautionary tale of what can happen when a villain complex is pushed too far.

Brent Faiyaz conquered three stages to become R&B’s resident villain. First of all, he sang like a ‘90s R&B heartthrob and coated his music with layers of devilish intent rarely seen by marketable baseball cap-wearing vocalists.

Secondly, he welded his rapping skills and blunt honesty to R&B’s often theatrical style. And finally – with Wasteland – Brent Faiyaz has deconstructed and shattered the villain’s mask.

7/10

Words: Niall Smith

Stream Wasteland below: