“are u alone?” By ego n friends Is Already the Album of the Year
Album cover by Erik Branom and Tomas Muelling
On Tuesday, June 11, Denver-based indie pop artist ego n friends dropped the album of the year. Is that a wild statement to make? Yes. But is it true? Also yes. I know we’re only halfway through 2024, but are u alone? already feels both timeless and ahead-of-the-curve. While I’ve never heard anything quite like it, are u alone? is reminiscent of other innovative, genre-blending, and totally unexpected artist collaborations. Think Kanye working with Bon Iver, Vince Staples rapping on a SOPHIE beat, Gorillaz’s feature-filled Humanz album, or James Blake and Lil Yachty’s recent project. Let’s get into it.
In this era when every artist is terrified of losing their audience’s attention, I’ve come to appreciate the artists willing to take a leap of faith with full-length projects. Here, the risk pays off big time. Are u alone? is a 19-track album, which may sound excessive in today’s music landscape. But it’s a 19-track album with no skips. Ego n friends pulls this off by keeping each track under three minutes long, so that the total runtime clocks in at just under 45 minutes. He strikes the ideal compromise between brevity and length by using each short song like a building block, assembling them into a fully fleshed-out album. The album’s variety and track order keeps the pace at a steady clip, so that 45 minutes breezes by. I don’t want to hear any more about how “nobody listens to a long album these days,” because if you have enough strong material, it’s absolutely doable.
Photo by Andrew Hanson
That being said, ego n friends’s path as an artist makes a good case for waiting a few years before releasing a debut album. It’s obvious when listening to are u alone? that so much thought and intention went into every aspect of this album. That can’t be rushed; it takes time, patience, experience, and skill. Ego n friends played the long game by experimenting with several different genres before making a definitive debut, and as a result, his album carries traces of many musical styles. The tracks on are u alone? fall into two main categories, his bespoke “nostalgic indie pop,” and alternative rap. While deftly intermingling hip-hop with indie music, the album is also spiked with elements of funk, blues, R&B, and EDM. But, it avoids what I see as the two most common pitfalls of genre-blending projects: giving the listener whiplash with radically different songs back to back, and losing the artist’s original sense of identity in an effort to show versatility. Thoughtful transitions help build continuity between the songs, even when switching lanes genre-wise, and the naturally conversational cadence of ego n friends’s voice helps make the shifts between rapping and singing less abrupt. Because he produced, mixed, and mastered the entire album, his ethos is tangible throughout the project, even with his namesake “friends” as frequent features. Thanks to his signature cinematic production style, every song is unmistakably an ego n friends track.
However, each guest imprints a little bit of their own artistic DNA onto their collaborations as well. Ason Yugen brings his ‘90s boom-bap flavor to the throwback banger “75c SODA.” Singer-songwriter Cameron Cade draws out a softer side of ego n friends on the ballad “LOVESTRUCK.” The Jack Dawkins-assisted “TALK TO MYSELF” is laced with the same echoey electronic tones found in Jack’s own music. Keenan TreVon lends his crooning R&B style to “COMFORTABLE” and “BIG MISTAKE!” The one notable exception is “GARDEN,” where rapper DNA Picasso detours into ego n friends’s indie territory. You would never know from this song that DNA’s natural singing voice is a rare find in his own discography. But even the featured artists who stay within their dominant genres sound fresh here, like something within them has just been unlocked. It’s impossible to pick a favorite song from are u alone?, but let’s just say that between “DEMON TIME” and “RUN BOBBY RUN!” (featuring A$cension’s Jupe$ and Solo V respectively), I’ll be praying for an ego n friends and A$cension full collab project.
Are u alone? is an unbelievable display of talent from everyone involved. Ego n friends leveled the fuck up on this album, and every single guest subsequently matched that energy. It really is a who’s who of Denver musicians at their best. (When people ask me about Denver music, this is the album I’m going to show them.) This debut from ego n friends is a triumph, and yes, it’s already the album of the year for me.
