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Shae Universe VibeZ

Shae Universe writes about love with the emotional literacy of someone who has thought hard about it. Sixteen tracks that reward slow listening.

Love's Letter: a British R&B album with something to say

Shae Universe is a London singer-songwriter of Nigerian heritage who has emerged as one of the most distinctive voices in the current wave of British R&B — a scene that has quietly become one of the strongest anywhere, running through artists like Cleo Sol, Jorja Smith and Olivia Dean.

What sets her apart is the framing. Love's Letter is structured as exactly what the title suggests: a sustained address on the subject of love in its various registers — romantic, self-directed, disappointed, restored. It opens with "Love Self" and closes, in this deluxe sequence, on "Ebbs & Flows." That is not accidental.

What to listen for

"More Than Enough" featuring Lalah Hathaway is the centrepiece and a genuine event — Hathaway, daughter of Donny and one of the most harmonically sophisticated singers alive, does not appear on records casually. Her presence is both a co-sign and a masterclass.

"LOML" and "Passenger Princess" are the singles, and both appear again in alternate versions on the deluxe — "LOML Acoustic" with Joseph Solomon and Jace strips it to voice and guitar, and "Passenger Princess" with Aqyila adds a second perspective.

"Oh, Wait..." is the sharpest turn on the record, and the Nao feature on the deluxe version deepens it considerably. "What's Luv?" and "No Capacity" carry the album's most direct writing — the latter title being a small masterpiece of contemporary phrasing.

"Warzone (Interlude)" does what a good interlude should: changes the temperature without breaking the thread. "Summertime" appears twice, including an ESTA. remix that pushes it somewhere warmer and more elastic.

Sixteen tracks including the deluxe additions. An album to play in order.

Go deeper

The Lalah Hathaway feature is an invitation to go further. Her Lalah Hathaway Live is one of the most technically astonishing vocal records ever released — she sings chords, audibly, which should not be physically possible.

For the British R&B scene Shae Universe belongs to: Cleo Sol, Nao (who features here), Bellah, Tiana Major9 and Sault are the essential names. It is arguably the strongest concentration of soul songwriting anywhere right now, and it operates almost entirely outside American attention.

For the Nigerian-British thread specifically, Obongjayar and Little Simz are working related territory from very different angles.

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