Zayn's Icarus Falls Is 27 Tracks And 88 Minutes Of Pure R&Z

"Sweet baby, our sex has meaning," Zayn sings to start the smooth, yacht-tastic "Let Me," the lead track on his second album, Icarus Falls. It's finally out as of Friday (December 14), and much like his 2016 debut, Mind of Mine, it's full of the hazy, soft R&B he first left One Direction to explore. There really are moody showcases for Z to flex his golden voice, like the Malay-produced "Stand Still," and plenty of serene, tender moments of romantic abandon, like the skin-on-skin mentions on "Natural."


Yet none of these things are what you'll notice first. You may not even notice the cover art that much, honestly. Nevertheless you'll definitely take note that Icarus Falls has 27 songs, and it's 88 minutes long. It's a beast.





For reference, Toy Story is only 81 minutes long. Case in point, Vulture put with each other a really handy list of films under 90 minutes last year — Icarus Falls is longer than all of these. Although, it isn't, case in point, longer than Drake's Scorpion or Migos's Culture II, two behemoths likely designed to be sprawling sort in attempt to help boost chart performance.


needless to say, Zayn released a whopping nine songs ahead of the album, dating back to April, so he sort of had to double, or in this case triple, down on music for the particular release. He notably didn't tour beyond his first album also, giving himself time away from the rigors of the road concentrate on himself. The dude had to show us what he's been up to.


Icarus Falls is worth spending some time with, letting each song sink in and finding your favorites. While in, Zayn shows the same sort of eagerness he flaunted for weeks on Instagram earlier this year any time he teased a slew of new music. Likely some of that acoustic noodling ended up here as complete songs, which is sort of neat.


It's also remarkable how much Zayn sounds like Jeff Buckley on "Satisfaction," and it also made me laugh how the album's only two features — Nicki Minaj on "No Candle No Light" and Timbaland on "Too Much" — are buried at the very end, like a reward for your dedicated patience.


There's a lot to dig into, so stream all 88 minutes of Icarus Falls above. It's brilliant for a long vehicle or train ride.