Music / Negro Swan

Follow that sea / Chase what you know / Cover your weave / Jump in the fall

"My newest album is an exploration into my own and many types of black depression, an honest look at the corners of black existence, and the ongoing anxieties of queer/people of colour, a reach back into childhood and modern traumas, and the things we do to get through it all. The underlying thread through each piece on the album is the idea of HOPE, and the lights we can try to turn on within ourselves with a hopefully positive outcome of helping others out of their darkness."

- Dev Hynes, posted on his Instagram in a press release for the album.

Chase your heron, choose to get off
Waste your time and critique the boss
Nothing is forgiven
Black skin and my rhythm
And you know that it's all at a cost

- "Minetta Creek"

Negro Swan is the fourth studio album (sixth overall) by singer-songwriter and producer, Dev Hynes under his Blood Orange mantle.

A diaphanous and wispy Alternative R&B record. It delves heavily into themes of gender, sexuality, depression and alienation. With themes of surviving childhood trauma, the anxieties of queer folk and people of colour and the concept of self-love, it would be a development of the sound Dev had formulated on his previous record Freetown Sound and would contain more noted features from artists such as Project Pat and Janet Mock, who would do several spoken interludes on the album.

Tracklist

1. "Orlando" (3:03)
2. "Saint" (3:12)
3. "Take Your Time" (2:51)
4. "Hope" (4:00)
5. "Jewelry" (4:32)
6. "Family" (0:42)
7. "Charcoal Baby" (4:02)
8. "Vulture Baby" (1:14)
9. "Chewing Gum" (4:24)
10. "Holy Will" (4:22)
11. "Dagenham Dream" (2:45)
12. "Nappy Wonder" (2:38)
13. "Runnin'" (3:55)
14. "Out of Your League"
15. "Minetta Creek" (1:58)
16. "Smoke" (3:33)

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Take your tropes, it's all you'll ever know

• A Wild Rapper Appears!: An odd variation, in which, rapper Puff Daddy appears on the track "Hope", but only there to perform ad libs and the lyric "Bring hope / I still smile when you come around" and a spoken interlude near the end of the track.
  • "Chewing Gum" plays this straight with A$AP Rocky and Project Pat appearing to rap on the track.
• Bullied into Depression: "Orlando" and "Dagenham Dream" are about Dev's personal experiences with bullying and the poor self-image that resulted from it.
  • "Charcoal Baby" is also considered this mixed with a bit of Self-Empowerment Anthem, given that Dev has said that the track is "a celebration of black skin."
• Broken Record: "Charcoal Baby" with "Can you break sometimes?".
• Concept Album: The record predominantly deals with themes of depression and trauma experienced abjected groups such as LGBTQIA+ folk and people of colour.
• Family of Choice: Discussed on the track "Family":
  "You asked me what family is and I think of family as community. I think of the spaces where you don't have to shrink yourself. Where you don't have to pretend or to perform. You can fully show up and be vulnerable. And in silence, completely empty and. That's completely enough. You show up, as you are, without judgment, without ridicule. Without fear or violence, or policing, or containment. And you can be there and you're filled all the way up. So we get to choose our families. We are not limited by biology. We get to make ourselves. And we get to make our families."
• Gospel: "Holy Will" is a full-blown gospel song that has singer Ian Isiah ask God to give meaning to his life.
• Happy Ending: With all the tracks either being assessments of surviving trauma and living with alienation. "Smoke" ends the record with a Self-Empowerment Anthem about having confidence in one's self and appearance.
• Incredibly Long Note: Done in couplets on "Take Your Time", with the falsetto on the lyric "so far" being held for at least six to seven seconds.
• Lyrical Cold Open: "Hope":
  Follow that sea
  Chase what you know
  Cover your your weave
  Jump in the fall
• Lyrical Dissonance: Despite the soft, dreamy atmosphere of the music. The lyrics deal with everything from bullying to to cultural appropriation.
• Miniscule Rocking: "Family", "Vulture Baby" and "Minetta Creek"
• No Ending: Multiple songs such as "Charcoal Baby", "Out of Your League" and "Chewing Gum" end abruptly. As though cut off in the middle of the track.
• One-Word Title: "Orlando", "Saint", "Hope", "Jewelry", "Family", "Runnin'" and "Smoke"
• Pretty Fly for a White Guy: Seemingly critized on "Vulture Baby" with Dev saying about the track:
  "I’m basically talking about an artist—who shall not be disclosed. But I read an interview with them talking about how they were done with hip-hop culture and wanted to go back to… actually, you know what, this could be applicable to a lot of artists last year, now that I think of it. It’s about white people who have got their cred by flirting with rap culture, and now they’re gonna show their country roots."
• Self-Empowerment Anthem: Multiple examples such as:
  • "Saint":
  Your skin's a flag that shines for us all
  You said it before
  The brown that shines and lights your darkest thoughts
  • "Smoke"
  The sun comes in, my heart fulfills within
• Song Style Shift: Near the end of "Chewing Gum" where Project Pat begins to rap, the song shifts into a chopped and screwed style before abruptly cutting off.
• Spoken Word: Janet Monk does several spoken word interludes within tracks, describing her life experiences and her own perspectives on being perceived as a LGBT+ person in the world.

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