On his second album, God Stated No, Omar Apollo wields his heartbreak like a butterfly knife. On “Finished With You,” an ethereal, brass-assisted pop music, he cloaks moments of devastating vulnerability with a protecting layer of indifferent cool. Within the shrugged-off refrain, he insists that he’s achieved along with his lover—a toughness that stands in stark distinction to his earlier, velvety pleas for them to let him go. The video matches this vitality, depicting the star as he alternates between waving blades on the viewer and working them painfully alongside his jawline. It’s a becoming visible illustration of a report the place Apollo sharpens a few of his darkest moments into glinting pop gems.

God Stated No originated from three months Apollo spent in London in 2023. Following the discharge of his debut full-length Ivory in 2022, excursions with SZA and Billie Eilish, and a nomination for Finest New Artist on the 2023 Grammys, the Mexican American singer-songwriter was driving knowledgeable excessive, however privately nursing a damaged coronary heart as he surveyed the wreckage of a relationship. Working with acquainted collaborators Teo Halm (right here as government producer), Carter Lang, and Blake Slatkin, Apollo first sketched out the 14 songs within the prestigious Abbey Highway Studios, later ending the album within the U.S. Along with his largest hit so far being the gut-wrenching “Evergreen (You Didn’t Deserve Me at All),” Apollo already has one thing of a repute as a heartbreak aficionado—as he not too long ago advised Complicated, “my pure state is at all times longing.” However on this report, he paints that emotion with each shade on his palette. God Stated No stretches far past downbeat balladeering; Apollo weaves his disappointment, anger, and self-doubt by a group of anthemic choruses and disco-tinged pop tracks.

On “Much less of You” and “Drifting,” Apollo remembers Robyn’s fashion of tearful dancefloor anthem, the previous combining Giorgio Moroder-esque vocoder melodies with a eulogy for a relationship that’s slowly evanescing, and the latter sprinkling Apollo’s romantic disillusionment over a breezy, Balearic-type beat. These shades of understated Europop are a brand new factor of Apollo’s sound, brooding the place as soon as he might need belted. However his voice stays the star of the present, notably when he’s buying and selling beautiful, tumbling melodies with Sudanese Canadian singer-songwriter Mustafa on the plaintive “Aircraft Bushes.”

Whereas they’re typically luxurious to hearken to, Apollo’s ballads signify the album’s least compelling moments. “Empty” and “Eliminate Me” meander drowsily, doing little to differentiate this report from his earlier bed room R&B releases. A meditative voice notice about grief from Pedro Pascal additionally wears skinny on repeat listens. The album is extra arresting when Apollo knowingly leans into the extra unhinged elements of heartbreak. Take the rousing lead single, “Spite,” the place, with a hook that bristles with scrumptious fury, Apollo walks a razor-thin line between loving and hating the accomplice who’s conserving him hanging on. Over sulky licks of guitar, he brings the complicated loneliness of a situationship to life by bittersweet vignettes of dying flowers, unread textual content messages, and lengthy flights taken alone. Elsewhere, he howls an embittered and determined hook on the expansive “How,” his anger as coldly insistent because the drum machine that backs it.

These wild-eyed moments trace at extra advanced and impressive potentialities for Apollo as a storyteller and as a pop star. On “Life’s Unfair,” a strutting funk-pop music, Apollo coolly admits to doing “one thing actual dangerous” to somebody he as soon as needed to marry. The trap-inflected standout “In opposition to Me” takes a form of hyper-masculine, posturing response to being dumped. On these songs, Apollo could also be filled with longing, however he’s additionally flawed, fired-up, and the self-proclaimed “baddest bitch.” God Stated No stands other than Apollo’s earlier releases not solely due to its style experimentation and its stickier choruses, however for its willingness to get ugly. Right here, Apollo has been knocked down, however he doesn’t play the sufferer. As a substitute, he bares his tooth.