Toward the end of the 2010s, Brent Faiyaz emerged as R&B's new face of dazed cool. Merging a feathery falsetto with stylishly ambient soundscapes and themes of fractured love, he announced his arrival with Into, an EP he dropped as part of the trio Sonder. Riding the momentum of a memorable hook on GoldLink's "Crew," he secured his position with Sonder Son, a debut album coated in sullen croons, introspection, and brooding atmosphere. Released amid his rise to stardom, the project dives into the world of an everyman dreamer—a haze of impressionistic memories, big ambitions, and vignettes of life-changing transition. Easing into lithe Spanish-guitar strings of "First World Problemz / Nobody Carez," Faiyaz discovers tranquility in aspirations and temporary poverty. The details are as symbolic as they are Earthly, rendering a portrait of the quiet appreciation you can find in washing your clothes in the sink, hanging with the bros, and living to breathe another day. Meanwhile, "Missin Out" sees him drift over an astral beat for a track that's as pleading as it is petty, giving a potentially lucky somebody one more chance to kick it before he begins his L.A. fairy tale. It could be a prelude to an "I told you so," but his wispy tenor and the spacy beat emit genuine longing from a soon-to-be playboy. He seeps into vindictiveness again on "Needed," where he remembers a woman who doubted him before his fame only to claim she believed in him the whole time. Brent looks to the present and future, but he's most powerful making trips to the past. For "Gang Over Luv," he serves up a misty tribute to the old days, suffusing a bare-bones instrumental with images of empty pockets, brotherhood, and pulsing teenage hormones. The beat is spare, but he layers it in supple backing vocals that infuse it with a ghostly ambience. It's simultaneously mournful and accepting—a silhouette of lingering feelings and evaporating innocence.