Singer-songwriter, producer and rapper Mereba's idiosyncratic, vibe-y songs often have a breezy quality to them, so it's quite fitting that she has named her sophomore full-length album The Breeze Grew a Fire. Her fire has also always been present in her meditations on freedom, her mission statement encapsulated in the pursuit of Black liberation and joy.
The Breeze Grew a Fire marries these elemental features of Mereba's compositions in more relaxed, often guitar-driven arrangements than its predecessors, 2019's wide-ranging The Jungle Is the Way Out (2019) and 2021's alt-R&B commitment AZEB. Here, she's not flipping through a genre rolodex — she's flowing intuitively, supplementing each track with the atmospherics that best serve alongside co-producer Sam Hoffman.
Carrying on the theme of its title and Mereba's fixation on deliverance, multiple LP highlights are homages to birds: the bouncy, sauntering funk of "White Doves" and airborne folk pop of "Hawk" both feel like zephyrs to the face, while "Heart of a Child" embraces a skittering beat for its anthemic joy ride, parting the clouds with the sheer force of melody.