Fix Your Face

In January 2025, Masego lost his home in the wildfires that ravaged Southern California. The Kingston-born singer-saxophonist-songwriter had been living in Los Angeles for a decade, and during that time he’d experienced success both as a performer and as a collaborator with the likes of Don Toliver and Kehlani. The experience of losing his home led to him re-evaluating his life, and <i>Fix Your Face</i>, his third full-length, is one result of that introspection. Opening with the twinkling <b>“Sounds Like...”</b>, which recounts a head injury that reoriented his career trajectory from basketball to, eventually, music, <i>Fix Your Face</i> combines intricately crafted R&B (and guest appearances from the likes of Buju Banton and Musiq Soulchild) with clear-eyed lyrics about balancing inner tumult with real-world pressures. On <b>“Breathe”</b>, Masego deals with the complexities of grief amidst a gospel choir and urgent strings, his wounded yelp slicing through the music as he laments, “I just can’t stop, the world won’t stop.” The slowly grooving Keyshia Cole duet <b>“Someone”</b> frames its anxieties in flinty guitars before a saxophone swoops in, shining a bright beam on its couple’s issues; the infidelity-grappling <b>“Symone”</b> pairs a delicate acoustic guitar and loop of someone insouciantly declaring they’re “just fine” with Masego’s tense ruminations. <i>Fix Your Face</i> is a long-range look at Masego’s life—complete with a maternal figure who throws out the album’s title as an order—that uses finely honed soul music to cushion the blow of life’s harder truths.