Tyler, the Creator never shied away from sharing what he thought his life was missing. The lines between desire and reality and internal monologue and human conversation all become blurred. On top of that, Tyler’s synthetic falsetto singing adds a surreal element to Igor. The whole album is sustained by mutating, colorful chords, impressionistic cracks in tonality. Tyler’s interpretation of this sort of stream-of-consciousness feels weightless. It reminds me of Solange’s When I Get Home or King Krule’s The Ooz, albums that succeed in communicating mood as their own sense of logic. As Tyler grapples with uncertainty and unfulfillment, he delivers an album that feels like it is suspended in midair. Igor may be unsettled but it never feels restless. Most songs don’t even have a natural ending, they just snap off, like someone pulled the aux cord abruptly. Combined with the Kanye West–assisted “Puppet,” these tracks in their varied tone and tempo reflect the volatility of Tyler’s emotions across Igor. It’s during this stretch that Tyler is at his most creatively fluid, as on “A Boy Is a Gun,” where he flattens his voice to sing “gun,” sounding like a laser cutting across the track and maybe also through his own psyche. There’s a run at Igor’s center where each song’s momentum seems to propel him forward emotionally. The parting ultimately leads to self-discovery: “You never lived in your truth,” he tells his ex. “Take your mask off,” he advises on “Running Out of Time,” “Stop lyin’ to yourself, I know the real you.” It’s an empathetic turn from an artist previously allergic to other people’s perspectives. “I hope you know she can’t compete with me,” he first sings on “Gone, Gone / Thank You,” before shifting his tone: “Thank you for the love/Thank you for the joy.”Īs the album progresses, Tyler goes through his undulations of denial and acceptance, but spends considerable energy hoping to help his beloved find satisfaction, even if that means a future without him. Igor becomes a gracious and giving breakup album whose narrative is fleshed out more clearly later in the record: Tyler seems to have fallen for a man (“You’re my favorite garçon,” he sings at one point) who wants to return to his female partner. He doesn’t sound like he’s lying to quickly repair deep damage, as his words may suggest, he’s just being sincere.
The first we hear of Tyler’s vanishing relationship is on “ Earfquake”: “Don’t leave, it’s my fault.” First pitched-up and later untreated, Tyler’s voice is pleading but not cloying.
The brightness is defiant, as Tyler processes the loss of someone he loves. Atop this budding dread, Tyler layers candied keys and harmonizing vocals. The opening “ Igor’s Theme” serves less as a guiding force and more like a recurring motif of doom that hides in the shadows and pops its head in at select moments, like on “New Magic Wand” where spooky synths erupt below Tyler’s thought process: “I saw a photo, you looked joyous,” goes one of the more poignant lines.
Songs don’t build to a crescendo, they often begin there. Tyler, who proudly produced, wrote, and arranged the album, is singing more but he’s not worrying whether his tracks have a traditional pop arc. Igor sounds like the work of a perfectionist giving shape to his more radical ideas.
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