Mac Miller

Balloonerism review | Posthumous Mac Miller album floats close to the late rapper’s best

Mac Miller’s second posthumous album Balloonerism is full of introspection and beautiful production. If it is the final album from his estate, it’s a special way to let his music rest.

The announcement that Mac Miller’s lost album Balloonerism would be released by the Miller estate left fans with mixed feelings. The second posthumous album since Miller’s death in September 2018, it was originally recorded back in late 2013 and early ‘14 and ultimately left unreleased in favour of the acclaimed mixtape Faces.

It was an understandable fear for fans that this album could lack coherence and instead be a jumbled mess of half-completed songs that didn’t quite make the final cut on other works. Distasteful cash-grabs under the guise of posthumous albums have been a fairly common occurrence in rap music specifically, with Skins by XXXTenacion and Juice Wrld’s Fighting Demons presenting fans with unfinished tracks fleshed out to make an album that doesn’t quite feel authentic enough for the artist.

Thankfully, that’s far from the case, as Miller’s seventh studio album keeps his legacy intact, with ponderings of death gaining an added sinister significance since his passing, compared to when leaks of the album first surfaced almost a decade ago. This work is brought to life further by the release of a 20-minute animated film, directed by Samuel Jerome Mason, which follows a group of outcast school kids on a colourful yet anxiety-inducing trip.

Miller spends the 58-minute runtime floating through drug-fuelled highs and existential lows as he attempts to mask his feelings of personal regret and loneliness with upbeat jazzy synths and crescendoing drums. It’s a trippy, experimental and often unsettling reflection of Miller’s troubles with drugs and depression, following a consistent tone that almost reaches a euphoric state before his balloon is burst and he falls back down to earth.

The two opening tracks, ‘Tambourine Dream’ and ‘DJ’s Chord Organ’, feel like a ritualistic summoning of Miller as it takes us five minutes before we hear his voice. Nevertheless, he is present as Larry Fisherman – his producer alter ego – who injects emotion into the second track with the underlying chord organ and the building drums. This slow-burning intro benefits from the welcome addition of SZA’s angelic vocals, opening the floor for Miller to reflect: “I know you miss your lifetime / Tell me the truth about it.” As a sign of faith in the late rapper’s work, SZA revealed via Instagram that the ‘DJ’s Chord Organ’ remains entirely unchanged from its original recording.

Tracks like the lead single, ‘5 Dollar Pony Rides’, and ‘Stoned’, balance anthem-like choruses with vibrant synths and basslines in an attempt to mask Miller’s struggles. Yet his brutally honest lyricism reveals all, as he confronts himself about where he would be without drugs on ‘Mrs Deborah Downer’, with crashing cymbals bringing him to an existential halt.

The stark contrasts in the album’s sequencing from ‘Mrs Deborah Downer’ to ‘Stoned’ remind us  just how difficult it was for Miller to leave drugs behind, using them as relief from his turbulent life, despite various stints of being sober before his passing.

Balloonerism ends Miller’s existential crisis in a rather Dickensian way: the screaming children on ‘Excelsior’ reminding Miller of his imaginative childhood, before he ponders his beliefs and the idea of death on ‘Manakins’ and ‘Rick’s Piano’ and, finally, accepting the idea of death on the epic and eerie closing track ‘Tomorrow Will Never Know’. 

The pairing of ‘Larry Fisherman’ and Thundercat as producers works remarkably well for this dark yet explosively fun album. Thundercat’s distinctive jazz-funk sound brings an energy to the album which balances itself well with Fisherman’s lo-fi style.

Although Balloonerism was only meant to be a lost album that would struggle to follow up on the 2020 album Circles, it has perfectly found its place at the end of Miller’s discography. Miller said in a 2013 interview about the closing track ‘Tomorrow Will Never Know’: “I’ve been listening to it to go to sleep every night.” 

Although it’s not confirmed whether this will be Miller’s last posthumous album, it would certainly be a special way to let his music rest, as the final coherent swansong of an artist that has touched so many.


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