2022 has been an up and down year for music, but possibly one of the most confusing albums of this year is I Know NIGO!; mixed and produced by a fashion designer.

Nonetheless, Nigo racked up an impressive list of features from A$AP Rocky, Pharrell Williams, Kid Cudi, Lil Uzi Vert, and more. 

Starting off, “Lost and Found Freestyle 2019” with A$AP and Tyler, The Creator kicks off the album with an upbeat feel and hyped-up vibes. That being said, the beat switch for Tyler’s verse is a rough transition, not to mention it’s nowhere near his best lyricism.

Following with “Arya” with A$AP, the second track is something that, in my opinion, A$AP could have done better working by himself—the beats throughout this song are nothing all that special or creative.

“Punch Bowl,” featuring Pusha T and Clipse, was a diamond in the rough on this album. Again, it is a bit repetitive and inventive, but I appreciated how well this fits on my “I need to get stuff done” playlist, and I can definitely see this song frequenting a lot of car rides for me.

The fourth track, “Functional Addict” with Pharrell Williams and Gunna, was a combination I absolutely did not need to hear. This beat was not created for either of these two artists to be featured on it; frankly, I don’t know what Nigo was thinking. This song was simply not catered to the vocal skills of either of these artists, and I also don’t love the concept of a Gunna and Pharrell Williams collaboration—as this track showed us, it just doesn’t work.

One of the songs I was most excited about was “Want It Bad” featuring Kid Cudi. Cudi has a long history of electropop beats and mixes, and this song definitely stuck to that. Nigo was smart to play to Cudi’s strengths here, and it’s clear he really took this opportunity and ran with it. Is it my favorite song from Cudi? No. But it’s definitely a very him song. From rapping offbeat and a creative mix to spaced out and faded vocals, this song would fit right in with Man On The Moon III: The Chosen, Cudi’s third installment of the Man On The Moon trilogy and eighth overall album.

“Paper Plates,” with Pharrell Williams and A$AP Ferg, was one of the most impractical songs on the entirety of this album. It reminds me of one of those songs that you hear a snippet of on a T.V. show or movie and think, “this is super good,” but then you go and listen to the full version of it and you have to turn it off halfway through. While I think it’s definitely a cool track, I personally won’t be listening to it in a group setting—it’s simply not that kind of song.

Following “Paper Plates,” and seemingly swooping in to save the day, is “Hear Me Clearly,” featuring Pusha T. It’s that kind of rap that’s made up completely of run-on sentences, which is a style I’ve definitely been getting into lately since I love the way it makes the music and suspense build. This song was an excellent example of how to use a beat that doesn’t have much going for it, and Pusha T packed this track with back-to-back lyrics—I can definitely see this becoming one of my favorite tracks.

An interesting beat and artist combination on this album, that actually ended up being decent, was “Remember” featuring Pop Smoke. It was a style of mix I’ve never seen Pop Smoke on, and one I would’ve never expected, and it turned out not half bad. Some portions of the beat definitely aren’t my favorite, but this was definitely outside of the artist’s comfort zone which is commendable at the very least.

The following track, “Heavy,” with Lil Uzi Vert was something I would have expected Pop Smoke on, definitely not Uzi. All things considered, this track could have been worse, and it’s definitely growing on me the more I listen to it. Uzi’s energy also seems to diminish quite a bit throughout, leaving the ending of the track to fizzle out which, in my opinion, really was the make or break of the song.

The final track definitely closes the album out with a bang; “Come On, Let’s Go” with Tyler sets the mood of the track-list back to the beginning, almost like a reset after sandwiching some really good songs with some really bad songs. This song would have hit harder if the rest of the songs were as strong as this one, but unfortunately, this album was filled with more than a few disappointments. While I appreciate the attempts for artists to step outside of their usual styles and comfort zones, it didn’t really come together on this album.