Following his breakthrough 2020 single "Upside Down," singer
Jake Pierrelee, aka
JVKE, brings his emotive pop and R&B into full flower with his full-length debut, 2022's
this is what ____ feels like, Vol. 1-4. Produced and recorded with his brother Zac Lawson (aka ZVC), the album finds
JVKE ruminating on what feels like a relationship gone bad. Conceptually, the album is broken into four sections with songs that fill in the blank of the title: "This Is What Falling in Love Feels Like," "This Is What Heartbreak Feels Like," "This Is What Sadness Feels Like," and finally "This Is What Heartbreak Falling Out of Love Feels Like." Musically, these are sonically cross-pollinated productions, meshing crystalline classical piano lines and strings (
Pierrellee cites composer
Franz Liszt as an influence) with bombastic hip-hop grooves, blown-out synths, and folky guitar accents. All of this nicely frames
Pierrellee's yearning, highly resonant vocals, straddling the line between the introspective rap-influenced pop of
Mike Posner and the hooky, dance-oriented style of artists like
Taio Cruz and
Justin Timberlake. Particularly engaging is "Golden Hour," a shimmering love ballad in which
Pierrellee croons against a cascade of piano and cello. Later, he contrasts his romantic euphoria with heartache, detailing his lover's betrayal with throaty, emo intensity on "This Is What Heartbreak Feels Like." This added narrative layer has a cinematic quality, one in which you don't just visualize
JVKE's emotional experience, but feel it, too. ~ Matt Collar