Amaarae’s New Album ‘Black Star’ Explores Love, Desire, and Euphoria

In her latest record, Black Star, named after Ghana's national symbol, Amaarae leans firmly into a part of her heritage that is now more receptive to her sound. Black Star — defined in the context of this lush, energetic, and dizzyingly beautiful record — is a metonym for other things aside from Amaarae's Ghanaian heritage. It's an expansion of that heritage through the lens of personal identity and calculated hedonism.

A strong opener

Black Star opens with "Stuck Up", a Brazilian funk-flavored track with euphoria-laced lyrics. The most important instruction in the song starts with the first line, "Turn out the lights." It sets the tone for the globalist and dance music-coded sensibility of the album, as well as the escapist promise of the record. Throughout the album, one that is sprawling with syrupy declarations of affection and sharp observations from Amaarae's POV, Amaarae centres the irresistible pull of late nights in dark clubs powered by expensive pills, bold innuendos, and a strong invitation to step into the middle of the dancefloor and lose yourself in the wave of the music.

Amaarae dials up the glamour

Amaarae is moved by the finer things in life. In previous records, she calculated the importance of said finer things in her life and considered the weight they have over her identity and how she is perceived. In this record, Amaarae is firmly grounded, now aware of the power that fame and fortune afford her. What that looks like is Amaarae as the orchestrator and conductor of energy. She has a specific, edgy taste and has the means to bring it to life. In tracks like "Fyneshit," she role-plays a distractedly devoted benefactor to her object of desire. "She can't be out alone, I'm buying all her clothes, it's whatever she wants," she croons over a cheeky dance beat that's redeemed by the snarky, shark-toothed bite of her lyrics. And in the lead single "S.M.O.," Amaarae plays it cool. "They don't get how you can fit in the digits, and still fit a bitch in the blunty," she brags at the height of the second verse.

The body as a dance floor

In Black Star, the dance floor is as metaphoric as it is physical. Its location isn't some dingy warehouse lined with speakers and insatiable bodies. The location is in the body itself. This is where Amaarae situates all the excitement. The lush cocktail of expensive drugs in tracks like "Starkilla" featuring Bree Runway and Starkillers, with a three-line chorus that goes "Ketamine, coke and molly," and the blend of desire and openness that mirrors the vulnerability triggered by a delicious high in "She Is My Drug" where she asks, "Do you believe in love off the drugs? I can feel the rush and I lean into you".

Embracing the contradiction

The thumping techno of the third track in the album, "ms60" featuring Naomi Campbell, ends with a statement that encapsulates the thematic core of Black Star. "They call me a bitch, a villain, controversial diva, no, I am the Black Star, Pose," Campbell declares. Campbell, whose illustrious modelling career has turned her into an unshakeable cultural figure, has always been at the centre of controversy, the latest being the alleged financial misconduct of a charity of which she has denied any knowledge. In a parallel move, Amaarae puts forward a complex perspective in this record. She is at once a love-struck lover trying to win over an object of desire, just as she is firmly detached, floating above matters of romantic devotion. Both artists complement each other in the awareness of their contradictions, mining it into a shimmering, beguiling piece of work. But if you are looking for what anchors their being, trace through the lyrics of "ms60" where Amaarae and Campbell make their allegiances known to Versace, Gilliano, Dior, and Yves Saint Laurent.

A good time

At the end of the day, Amaarae wants the listener to have a good time. She also wants whoever is paying attention to watch her have a good time. It's a generous proposition that's hard to refuse, considering how well Amaarae can establish a vibe. She knows what gets a club going and what can throw the mood into brief moments of reflection, as with tracks like "Dream Scenario" featuring Charlie Wilson. In it, Amaarae swims over the slowest and calmest beat in the entire record, singing "Something 'bout her sanctimonious, I'm her savior". Wilson closes out the track singing "It's all about you, baby (Baby), It's all about you, you, you, sweet baby" over and over like a reminder. This ability to set a mood is evident in the follow-up song "100DRUM," whose intro is sung entirely in Akan and is underlaid with a bouncy Baile funk beat, before reaching a crescendo that then unfurls into a sped-up dance groove. In Black Star, Amaarae establishes her longevity, her incomparable capacity for reinvention, and most importantly, an admirable talent for giving the people what they didn't know they needed.