The Divine Feminine

It would have been a fair claim, back in 2016, to call <b>Mac Miller</b> the most improved rapper of the early 2010s. Over the course of five years and three albums, the Pittsburgh native fought for every bit of his steadily accruing critical acclaim, shirking off the “frat rap” label bestowed upon him around the time of <i>Blue Slide Park</i> (the first independently distributed debut album to top the Billboard 200 chart since 1995). Each subsequent release from Miller felt like a quantum leap in artistry, from the spacey <i>Faces</i> mixtape to his Delusional Thomas side-project to 2015’s <i>GO:OD AM</i>, a tight, honest album about trying to be a decent person. But his fourth album, 2016’s <i>The Divine Feminine</i>, arrived as the high-water mark for the 24-year-old rapper—a concept album about romance, intimacy and the power of women. The defining sound of the year 2016 was a certain warmth connecting releases by Chance the Rapper, Anderson .Paak and even <i>The Life of Pablo</i> by Kanye West. These were rap albums inflected with jazz, funk and neo-soul, arriving in the wake of Kendrick Lamar’s <i>To Pimp a Butterfly</i> and indebted to the influence of LA’s jazz/rap scene. On <i>The Divine Feminine</i>, Miller tapped into these midtempo grooves and grown-and-sexy attitudes, basking in a contagious, open-hearted warmth alongside many of the aforementioned luminaries. .Paak, Ty Dolla $ign and CeeLo Green delivered lusty hooks, while Robert Glasper and Thundercat contributed as performers. Lamar himself appeared on the climactic <b>“God Is Fair, Sexy Nasty”</b>. Still, the most scene-stealing cameo came from Ariana Grande on <b>“My Favorite Part”</b>—not her first duet with Miller, but their first one as an official couple. Every song on <i>The Divine Feminine</i> is a love song, but none describe a perfect love, or an easy one. But maybe that part is besides the point. The love described by Miller’s grandmother in the album’s outro transcends romance and gestures toward something cosmic—a worldview that does not discount the world’s darkness, but seeks to shed light all the same. It’s a love that persists in Miller’s music, echoing in the question he poses on <b>“Soulmate”</b>: “When you’re gone, what will you leave behind?”