Taking inspo from Andre 3000 with the lines, “I hope she don’t think that I think that she some kinda ho/I don’t care, that just lets me know that/She knows what she wants, yeah.” Letting us know that being a hoe simply means having the confidence to let people know what you want (including sex), Aiko confirms, “Yeah, I chose happiness over everything/Over anything and it’s everything.” But instead of this word being wielded derogatorily, it is intended as a term of endearment by way of being an acronym for Happiness Over Everything. This motif leads in perfectly to “hoe” featuring Miguel. Thus, Aiko bemoans, “Similar ways, similar game/Starting to feel the similar pain/Are you sure we haven’t met before?” Going through the same heartache repeatedly yet never seeming to learn her lesson, Aiko begins to reconcile that when it comes to the men she’s let into her life, it truly is same shit, different day, decrying, “You said you are different but you’re the same/Stranger, I cannot tell you/How many there have been/That were just like you I do not need you/‘Cause you’re just like them.” Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (think: “A Day in the Life”) vibes at a mere nine seconds before leading into “stranger.” A deeply personal song (not just for Aiko, but most women) that addresses a sense of déjà vu one gets when being similarly abused in different relationships. Starting with, naturally, “the beginning,” Aiko offers an auditory amuse-bouche that serves plenty of psychedelic Sgt. Fresh from bringing us Chilombo only last year (not yet knowing she had created an ideal quarantine record), Sailing Soul(s) continues the laid-back vibe that Hawaii inspired on the former, in addition to highlighting how Aiko’s earlier work remains resonant. Pulling a Blood Orange (à la Angel’s Pulse) by deciding to call Sailing Soul(s) a mixtape rather than an album, Jhené Aiko gives us a sonic reprieve from the daily ills of this world (though that always seems evermore impossible) with a re-release in honor of the ten-year anniversary of the 2011 album that showed the music world who she was.
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