GENA - The Pleasure Is Yours Review
Liv.e and Karriem Riggins team up and create an outstanding body of work that pushes creative fluidity, making it some of their most colorful and abundant work yet.
The newly-formed duo GENA, consisting of neo-soul vanguard Liv.e and 90s hip-hop producer Karriem Riggins, released The Pleasure Is Yours on February 27th. The album spans the artists’ strongsuits, bringing forth a colorful, expansive project that bleeds with sonic harmony and tasteful experimentation. TPIY finds Liv.e navigating her unique pockets of sound that charge through space with no apologies. The project fruitfully commands the floor, bodying mixtures of jazz-infected soul, spoken word poetry, and hip-hop rhythms.
In a recent “That Good Sh*t” interview, Liv.e spoke about TPIY, and was posed a question of the acronym GENA. Liv.e had mentioned that the name was inherently “God Energy, Naturally Amazing”, but she had seen the discourse of fans speculating the acronym's meaning, eventually pushing for listeners to conjure up what they felt GENA meant for them. This same creative freedom is what TPIY pushes for. Through the span of 16 tracks, Riggins and Liv.e have created a work of abundance, each listen entirely exclusive and challenging (in the best way possible). Liv.e’s fusion of neo-soul and poetry melts perfectly with Riggins' groove-heavy, drum driven beats, a synergy that’s birthed something we haven't been on before.
The album is ushered in by track “Who’s Got a Problem With Gena”, the jam session-esque record that sets the attitude for the project. Liv.e sings “Who's got a problem with GENA? Is it you? Not me!”, a perfectly tasteful crowd check. Liv.e plays around with her braggadocious vocals while Riggins hugs her bars with a brilliant beat, and this isn’t the only place we hear this. TPIY is a record that thrives off of creative impulse. Each and every one of the 16 tracks harbors something entirely different, and manages to marry off-kilter candidness and precision-cut artistry gorgeously. “Theybetterbegladihavetherapy”, a lo-fi improv-sounding track displays this nature perfectly with textured and conversational Liv.e vocals that sit on a slow trudging beat. This track is one of those moments that makes TPIY feel like a live performance, Liv.e diverting her verse at one point to an informal slander of “Which really means you are stupid…”.
“Readymade” finds this same tenacity laced within its dialogue, Liv.e breaking her own flow to check if she's in the right key. Liv.e’s ability to strut her verses while still falling back on her off-a-whim additives gives her music body and authenticity. This sets TPIY’s edge in place. Every song with Liv.e feels like a close conversation; Her music is intimate, close, and alive when listening, especially when provided with such a plentiful sonic landscape by Riggins. “TGD” feels like an homage to Liv.e’s 2023 Girl In The Half Pearl, a probing metronome and bursting synth guiding her through her humblebraggy lyrics. But we don’t see Liv.e skip a beat, or a beatING for that matter, in track “Left The Club Like ‘Really??’”, where we get to see her dip into her ‘bruise a bum’ alter-ego with punchy bars and euphoric movement.
It’s truly refreshing to see so much musical ground covered in one project. Whether it’s “This Is So Crazy”’s jazz-funk experimental grit, or “Unspokerrn”’s trudging, dissonant piano, TPIY tracks the duos’ malleability of their craft. Liv.e and Riggins hit every corner of the map, and excel while doing so. “Circlez”, the project's teaser/lead single, captures the cyclical nature of a devoted love interest with its melt-in-your ears jazz movement and Liv.e’s atmospheric vocals. Where “Circlez” leaves off with a proclamation of love, “HOWWEFLOW” picks it up with a swaggerful groove-based showboat. The track's rhythm digs its heels into a loosely-tied jazzy drum, where Liv.e rides her verse with controlled poise. Like many others off the project, this felt like Riggins’ pocket of Madlib production, mixed with a twinge of Badu spoken-word mastery. “omo iya ati baba” takes a prayerful moment apart from the other tracks, pushing for serenity. Yet moments like “DoobieDooWew”, mark the duo dipping into a brighter more citrusy sound, where Liv.e’s lyricism takes your ears to a woozy dream-led space. All things considered, each track meets its bar set by its predecessor, not a single moment left shadowed by the other.
The Pleasure Is Yours is a cunning, and rich project, filled with musical landscapes that provoke curiosity and excitement. Karriem Riggins’ hip-hop beat heroism and Liv.e’s soul sensibilities displayed a playful and experimental conversation. TPIY is one of those moments where you can feel the artists having fun while creating their work, and this is such a beauty to be able to experience. Riggins and Liv.e thrive in their freedom of form, and execution of playful spontaneity and masterful precision. Who knew the pleasure really was ours?