Childish Gambino debuted his entire new album at a special three-day event at Joshua Tree over the summer, but only announced its official release last month. Entitled “Awaken, My Love!”, the album is due out on December 2nd, and you can stream it in full below.
As hinted at by singles like the soulful “Me and Your Mama” and the space funk of “Redbone”, the new album marks quite a musical shift from 2014’s EP/mixtape STN MTN / Kauai and 2013’s full-length LP Because the Internet. Calling it a rap album would be to misidentifying the sounds, as it may just be the latest example in the ever-shortening gap between genres that has become modern hip-hop and pop.
It’s also not just about the music, as the man aka Donald Glover is using the album to innovate in other ways. He recently released a VR performance video for “Me and Your Mama” via his PHAROS Earth app, and announced that “Awaken, My Love!” will be released on mysterious “virtual reality” vinyl at some point next year.
All this, and he still has to act in Spider-Man: Homecoming, play Lando Calrissian in the Star Wars Han Solo anthology film, and get to work on the second season of his hit FX show, Atlanta. Assuming he’ll tour behind “Awaken”, 2017 is going to be a busy year for the Chilidish one. Take a listen to the album below.
Awaken, My Love! Tracklist:
01. Me and Your Mama
02. Have Some Love
03. Boogieman
04. Zombies
05. Riot
06. Redbone
07. California
08. Terrified
09. Baby Boy
10. The Night Me and Your Mama Met
11. Stand Tall
