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Ella Mai VibeZ

"Boo'd Up" was the record that reminded a whole industry that R&B could still go to number one on its own terms. Ten tracks trace where Ella Mai went next.

The London singer who reset the American R&B chart

Ella Mai Howell grew up between London and New York, auditioned for The X Factor as part of a group, and then did something more sensible: she started posting covers and originals to Instagram. Producer DJ Mustard found her there and signed her to his 10 Summers label, and the pairing turned out to be one of the more productive odd couples in modern R&B — a West Coast producer known for spare, bouncy rap beats working with a British singer steeped in 1990s soul.

The result was a run of EPs and then "Boo'd Up" in 2017, a slow-burning, almost weightless record that took the better part of a year to climb the charts before peaking at number five on the Billboard Hot 100 and winning the Grammy for Best R&B Song. It arrived at a moment when conventional wisdom held that R&B no longer crossed over, and it politely disproved the point.

What to listen for

"Boo'd Up" is here, obviously, and it still sounds like almost nothing else — that skipping, syncopated drum pattern and the "ooh" hook that functions as its own instrument. "Trip" is the follow-up that proved it wasn't a fluke.

The rest is the more interesting listening. "Naked" and "Close" lean into the 1990s R&B she clearly grew up on. "A Thousand Times" and "This Is" are the ballads where you hear how much control she has over a long line. "100" opens the set with more attitude than her reputation suggests.

"Jealous" with Kiana Ledé is the collaboration worth flagging — two singers who share a register and use it to trade rather than compete. "Love Me Like That (Champion Love)" closes things on a brighter note.

Ten tracks is a sampler rather than a survey, but it is well chosen. Start with "Boo'd Up" and then go backwards through the ballads.

Go deeper

The albums fill in what a ten-track sampler cannot. Ella Mai (2018) and Heart On My Sleeve (2022) are both stronger and stranger than the singles suggest, with more 1990s R&B DNA and more room for the band.

The DJ Mustard connection is worth following in both directions — his production for Ty Dolla $ign, YG and Roddy Ricch shows how far the same rhythmic instincts travel outside R&B.

For the British R&B context she came out of, Jorja Smith, Mahalia and Ray BLK all emerged around the same moment. And for the 1990s records that clearly shaped her, go to SWV, Total and Changing Faces.

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