KELELA - New Avatar

Kelela Mizanekristos has built a discography that is both map and territory: from that "Cut 4 Me" (2013) which launched her out of the ashes of the Fade To Mind collective, through the "Hallucinogen" EP (2015) produced by Arca, up to the official debut "Take Me Apart" (2017) and the sumptuous "Raven" (2023), she has redefined the boundaries of alternative R&B with a consistency few can match. Meanwhile, her name has bounced between illustrious collaborations (Danny Brown, Solange, Gorillaz) and even an acoustic interlude at New York's Blue Note, immortalized on "In The Blue Light" (2025), which revealed her jazz backbone and her love of folk and singer-songwriter craft.

With "New Avatar", the singer-songwriter takes a gamble that, on listening, reveals itself as a wonderfully right choice. The electronic coordinates that made her famous (future garage, UK bass, drum'n'bass, 2-step) are now shot through with distorted guitars, dreamy reverb and an energy that smells of shoegaze and reimagines a nu metal à la Deftones as produced by Warp. Kelela herself has described the album as an attempt to explore a "landscape that isn't typically tackled with R&B voices", and the result is astonishing.

The opener, “Idea 1”, is a manifesto: astral synths and scratching guitars. It's a beginning that promises chaos, but the record instead chooses a subtler path, and with “Point Blank” turns frustration into a bouncy groove.
The most surprising moments come when the record gives itself over to its most radical detours. “Linknb” stands out for its blend of nu metal riffs and syncopated drums with clear nods to hip-hop and funk. “Don't Piss Me Off” is a minimalist anthem, while “New Life Forms” with Fousheé is a hypnotic duet that pulls us into “The Bridge” with PinkPantheress, perhaps the most divisive moment: the production leans into a future garage sound that feels almost too sweet for the record's atmosphere. But it's also the moment where Kelela shows she can play by pop's rules without betraying her vision.

Kelela's music exists in a liminal space where the club and the bedroom meet, where R&B becomes a vessel for all the influences the African American diaspora has sown throughout contemporary music. As she herself has said, "R&B is probably the most expansive genre in the world", and "New Avatar" is proof that guitars, distortion and shoegaze are fully part of it. This is a record that shows just how much R&B can be rock, and how much power it can have when it lets itself be contaminated. How powerful it is to choose not to choose.

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15/07/2026