Khalid fans were primed for some new music when the 20 year-old R&B singer recently dropped the skittering single “Better.” On Friday (Oct. 19) he released the Suncity EP, which surrounds that banger with a suite of midtempo and seductive ballads as well as the sexy, funky bilingual title track, which features vocals from Empress Of.
With two evocative vocal-less interludes, the EP is really a 5-tracker, which properly kicks off with the silky “Vertigo,” a classic Khalid ballad in which he ponders, “Are we alive?/ Or are we dreaming?/ After the ride/ Are you living?” That slides into the acoustic guitar jam “Saturday Nights,” a chronicle about being young, confused and seeking your way in the world, followed by the infatuation slow jam “Motion.”
In the run-up to Suncity‘s release, Khalid tweeted that the EP would be the “start of a new era.” After recently winning an award for best soul/R&B male artist at the 2018 AMAs, Khalid told Billboard, “I never go in thinking about making a hit record. I just go into the studio with people I love and respect and see what happens. It’s more about getting to know my peers and putting our heart and soul into the music, and hopefully [the result] is something that we’re both proud of.”
Kahlid is currently in the studio working on his follow-up to his smash debut album, American Teen, which is due out in early 2019. In a statement about Suncity, the singer said, “More than anything in life right now I want growth. I want my music to grow and represent how I am growing up. Suncity is the start of a new era for me, this music poured out of me and I didn’t want to wait to share it. I wanted to be able to live in this moment with my fans and my friends and speak from the heart.”
Stream Suncity in full below.