Hi, everyone. Bully here, the internet's busiest music nerd. It's time for a review of this new NAV album, OMW2 Rexdale.

Here we have a brand new LP from one of one, rapper, producer, singer, songwriter, Canadian musical pioneer NAV. The man's fifth studio full-length album. Everything you really need to know about him history-wise, he pretty much tells you upfront in the middle of the fourth track on this album: "I've been in the game seven years, but I high, so it's all a blur / Damn right, I'm getting a lot, but I still ain't getting what I deserve."

With multiple projects under this man's belt at this point, he has success, industry connections, visibility, talent, but the respect and accolades he feels like he is owed may not, in fact, be there. Even if they are, he can't even remember it.

Now, you would assume a man who is as hungry and as ambitious as NAV historically is would still, at this point in his career, continue pushing for these things to get what he is owed. But OMW2 Rexdale is a record of a very different stripe. It is NAV operating in a lower, much more comfortable gear. I say comfortable, not because it sounds like the man's not trying, but because it sounds like on this record, he's finally ready to be himself.

So as a result of that, he is finally going back home to Rexdale, the town that he originated from. And in the process of going back to his roots, NAV is giving us an album, generously on this record that feels unfiltered, honest, unencumbered. He is doing him in a way that comes across as unapologetic and authentic. And he's not overloading this new record with any bloat or filler either. We're dealing with a project that is of a very trim 14 tracks and 36 minutes.

And he's really wearing his emotions on his sleeve with many songs on this album. He opens up in a relatively dark place with the first track on the album, bringing some very spacey production, bleak vocals and lyrics, with NAV noting that in life currently, he feels like he's standing all alone. Nobody hears his cries for help. He is alone in the world. He's losing himself, in fact. This is certainly a dramatic way to kick off the album. However, this is not the tone that the rest of the record is set.

This is really where NAV begins because this is where he currently is in his life in the music industry, and the rest of the record is the solution. We're going back to Rexdale. We're going to navigate back to where we came from, which is why we start to dig ourselves out of this pit of despair with the following song, "You", featuring Don Tolliver. What is NAV's movement, his change up, his solution to this sadness, this depression? First, off the bat, he wants to meet up with a woman. Slide on her. He is determined. The mood picks up. The beats are punchier. However, he does ask for her permission. He is a consent king. The vibe of this track, instrumentally and vocally between NAV and Don, it's very much giving late night, Drake & drive energy with the autotune, with all the layers of synthesizers, the reverb, the atmosphere. It's just pure sensual nocturnal bliss.

We then smoothly transition into the track "Stay Up", which the way we move into this track, it's so quick. It's like we're going scene to scene in a movie. And true to NAV's innovative spirit on this song, we have an interesting combination of ideas. It's like a combination of chopped and screwed and cloud rap, too, on this one. Not super lyrical, but the vibes are definitely there, and NAV and Don Toliver have a decent amount of vocal chemistry.

After this, "Burbs" sees NAV getting a little nasty, a little mean. It is a cold-blooded boperino. And not only does NAV get a little aggressive on this record, but a little playful as well on the next track featuring Playboi Carti, which is titled "Unlimited". Not only is this a a pretty goofy and fun track with lots of cool vocal chops in the background and the instrumental. Playboi Carti gives us a sharp earworm chorus with these repetitive calls of, "Rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out, rock out." But NAV is throwing out a lot of punny bars on this track. Even at one point does a silly little Playboi Carti impression saying, "Oh, my voice, no like Carti." It's pretty funny. It shows he has the capacity to not always be in this low in high state. And yeah, they bounce off of each other on the track pretty effectively.

Following this, though, "Back 2 Business". NAV does get back to business. I mean, he is a serious guy. He can't be silly all the time, and he does sound mean on this track. He actually foregoes the autotune a bit on this one and just gives us raw bars. Again, being consistent with this theme of dropping the façade and just being more himself, just being more up front, giving us a peek behind the curtain a little bit. And when we see what's behind the curtain on this track. We see almost like a very dark Shadow the Hedgehog type figure. He's sleeping with his op's sisters, which he's got to have a lot of ops. That's a lot of sisters. But yeah, liking the grimy nocturnal vibes on this track.

However, NAV is not just a fighter, he is a lover, too. And he makes that clear with numerous tracks. In the second half of this record, you have "U.N.I.", which translates to" You and I." Not just U and I, the letters, You and and you and I. And they say this man doesn't have wordplay. I mean, these are letters. That's letter play!

But yeah, not only are NAV's bars on this track, ooosing or with a side of rizz. But I like the way that a lot of his bars play into the vocal sample of the track in the background, too. Something that historically only the best MCs of all time have been able to pull off effectively in a song.

Then following this, we continue to be deeply in love in the tracklist. We have "One of None", which for NAV, telling someone he cares about them, that he has feelings for them, telling that person they're one of one. It's not enough. They're that rare, that important of a person. He's got to say, Hey, you're one of none.

These themes continue on to "Need You", where he obviously needs this person, and "Real Me", that has Metro Boomin on production. Love to see these two team up once again. But NAV's feelings for this person continues to see that icy exterior melt, where we hear him talking about being the real him on this track as a result of that affection, those feelings. NAV is deeply in love at this point on the record, but NAV is not just a lover of women. He loves his craft. He loves the game. He is a guy who also can't stay away from the substances, unfortunately. Drinking, smoking, so on and so forth. These have continued to be themes throughout NAV's catalog that really have haunted him, often showing him in a place where he is using these things to just fill a void.

On this track, he's really talking about his cup, that syrup, so on and so forth, and his desire for this, his need to get out of that sober mind state. It really plagues him on this track and throws him off of the progression of really being into somebody.

The song "Keep Going" then also sees him focusing back on his craft and his progression and everything else that he has to do with music and in life generally. And that sees this love cycle being broken, which is why we go back to "Get 2 You", where we revisit these romantic narratives. But in this instance, with this track, it's love on the rocks. The relationship is not going well. Trust has been smashed seemingly. Things go south at this point.

Then on the closing track, "Pain Away", he's singing about needing this person or needing some love or someone to be with him to take the pain away, which – we're seeing NAV back at square one in a way. He's lonely again. He's isolated. He's sad. He's in a pit of despair. He is experiencing serious pain that he needs to be taken away. He's looking for some outlet to throw that pain in, be it a drug, be it his work, be it a person.

I feel like that's the ultimate reveal of this record. It seems like for a moment, NAV is on a track for success and recovery. And doing something positive, really revealing and being true to himself in a healthy and life-changing way when what we realized by the end of the album is we're not on an ascent, we're not on a growth path, we're in a cycle. We are in a boom and bust cycle. We're sad, we're finding outlets, we're plugging in, we're riding high. Then when all of that comes crashing down because we're not really doing the work and we're all using this as a distraction to actually fix our problems, we're just going right back down into the pit and just doing it all over again, which, I mean, honestly, it's genius because he set out on this record to give us the real him, give us that honesty, and he did, but just not in the way that we thought we were going to get it.

Because all these other artists and rappers out here trying to tell a story along these lines and be inspirational and aspirational and so on and so forth – no, NAV is out here keeping it real. He's saying, You know what? All that is bullshit because all those guys saying that stuff at the end of the day, they're still messed up and they got their problems. I'm going to own my problems. I'm going to show you my problems, and I'm going to be honest with you and show you that I'm actually stuck in that shit. These cycles, these desires, all of this, I'm trapped.

Plugging into this stuff and trying to go back to your past and all that everything, none of that's going to fix the cycle. None of that's going to change anything. There's deeper work you need to do if you're ever going to break that. It's profound displays of the way life can just kick you in the teeth like this that continues to make NAV a standout, one-of-a-kind artist, which is why I don't hesitate for a moment to tell you that this is his best record yet, hands down, regardless of what the critics and the clueless fans say, which is why I'm feeling a decent to strong

Anthony Fantano, NAV, Forever.