Love Renaissance (LVRN), the record label consisting of members 6LACK, Summer Walker, Shelley FKA DRAM and more, has released its first project, Home For The Holidays.
As expected from the title, Home For The Holidays is a Christmas album that consists of covers of classic Christmas songs, as well as interpolations and original songs for the album.
With 6 songs and 3 skits, this 9-track project sits at just under 18 minutes in length. What Home For The Holidays lacks in length, however, it makes up for in quality.
The first song, “Ghetto Christmas (with 6LACK & Summer Walker),” is an interpolation of James Brown’s “Santa Claus Go Straight To The Ghetto.” The main difference between this track and James Brown’s apart from putting a unique spin on it is 6LACK’s verse. His addition to this already iconic song only makes it stand out more.
After a modern, rhythmic cover of the classic “Feliz Navidad,” OMB Bloodbath and Boogie are featured on the most hard-hitting, energetic Christmas song with their rendition of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” titled, “12 Days Of Bhristmas.”
This track, while still going through the 12 days of Christmas, isn’t quite like the original song people are used to hearing. On the ninth day of Christmas, Boogie did not receive nine ladies dancing as the original song says. He did, however, get a glock, which is more or less the same thing.
Turning a well-known Christmas song and completely recreating it to make it modern and hard-hitting is no easy battle, but OMB Bloodbath and Boogie seemed to do it with ease.
Following the energetic “12 Days Of Bhristmas” comes Summer Walker’s flawless cover of “Santa Baby.” Her pleasant, smooth voice carries throughout the track. The simple instrumental takes the backseat to Walker’s vocal talent.
Eli Derby’s cover of “This Christmas” is yet another minimal instrumental that allows Derby to show off his outstanding vocal inflections while doing the original song the justice it deserves. Shelley FKA DRAM closes the project with his cover of “Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting).”
DRAM’s calm, subdued voice is exactly what chestnuts roasting on an open fire should sound like. His low pitch is soothing and wraps up LVRN’s Christmas project with a sense of warmth and comfortability.
As the holidays are bound to look different this year, LVRN provided listeners with a now somewhat unfamiliar feeling of normalcy. Christmas music tends to be cheerful and in a world where there have been tremendous amounts of negativity, a simple project like this has the potential to boost spirits.
Rating: 5/5
