Grammy-nominated singer SiR has returned with Heavy, his first album in nearly five years, via Top Dawg Entertainment.
The 16-track offering includes the previously shared songs “Satisfaction,” “Life Is Good” featuring Scribz Riley, “Nothing Even Matters,” “No Evil” and “Karma” featuring Isaiah Rashad. The project features additional appearances from Anderson .Paak, Ty Dolla $ign and Ab-Soul.
As the album’s title suggests, Heavy explores weighty topics like depression, anxiety, addiction and relationship woes. While SiR unpacks some of his most vulnerable experiences over the last few years, he lightens the mood with songs like standout “Poetry In Motion” featuring Anderson .Paak, the previously mentioned “Life Is Good” and the closing track “Brighter.”
“This is about overcoming. This isn’t about the pain. The pain is visible, but I made it through the pain. I want people to see that first and foremost,” SiR exclusively tells Rated R&B.
In a 2022 interview with Rated R&B, SiR hinted at the direction of the album. “This project focuses a lot on my mental health. It talks about two sides of my life and how they intertwine,” he shared.
“I went through some stuff and had to figure out what I wanted. I think we do a good job of painting a very vivid picture of the duality of being an artist and a regular, everyday man. I know there’s music on here that people need to hear.”
SiR also discussed the meaning behind the album’s lead single, “Satisfaction.”
“‘Satisfaction’ was written in a tough time in my life relationship-wise,” SiR told Rated R&B. “It tells a tale of two cities: It tells the SiR side, and it tells the side of me being who I am as a man, a father and a husband. Sometimes I might want my cake and want to eat it too, but it doesn’t always work like that.”
He continued, “[I was] just trying to figure things out and trying to be as honest as possible with myself, as well as the people that I love the most.”
Heavy is the follow-up to SiR’s 2019 album, Chasing Summer, which debuted at No. 5 on Billboard’s Top R&B Albums chart.
Chasing Summer included his Kendrick Lamar-assisted single “Hair Down.” “I wrote that on the road we were on The Championship Tour,” SiR said on Power 106’s Nick Cannon Mornings. “I just wanted something that fans could feel confident when they sang it. I definitely feel like that translated so well, and getting [Kendrick] on it was a no-brainer. People ask me like ‘When did you decide that you wanted Dot on it?’ I definitely knew in the back of my head that it would be crazy to have him on there but I don’t ask anything of him.”
Stream SiR’s new album Heavy below.