Album Review: Sodalite by Jaleesa
Jaleesa carved out a space of comfort and confrontation. On Sodalite, it established her as an artist who writes with an open hand, offering affirmations and truths without disguise.
On her debut album Sodalite, Jaleesa builds a record around the qualities her chosen gemstone is said to carry: clarity, truth, and inner peace. The album announces itself as a project about honesty and healing, one that wants to remind listeners they are not alone in their struggles. She approaches this mission through direct, unvarnished songwriting, smooth arrangements, and a vocal delivery that boons intimacy over showmanship. She wants to feel both the sting of lived difficulty and the comfort of shared vulnerability, and she builds a musical space that balances confrontation with consolation. The ambition is not modest, and while not every word rises above the level of a mantra, her voice and her vision carry the record. “Woman” makes that clear from the first moments. Written down, the lyric looks almost skeletal, but in performance, it becomes a mantra of insistence. Jaleesa brings in layered voices that give it a communal dimension, underscoring the record’s focus on strength through truth.
At its best, this clarity cuts to the heart of things. She doesn’t complicate her message, and in that choice, she fulfills the clarity the album promises. The arrangement keeps things uncluttered, a retro-tinged soul that lets the affirmation stand unchallenged. “Confinement” shifts to intimacy, with light as its metaphor. “Confinement is a state of mind,” she sings, asking a lover to let the sunshine shine on her. “Every inch of me belongs to you, intellectually and physically” is disarmingly blunt, yet her delivery makes them feel tender instead of clinical. Harmonies fold around her lead vocal, creating a cocoon of warmth. This itself risks oversimplification, but the performance rescues it, reminding you that this is an artist who trusts directness more than ornament. “In Your Eyes” continues with that openness, this time shaded by frustration. She tells a partner, “You say that I’m unfocused, but you seek your own reflection when I’m right here.”
Across her debut record, there’s little metaphor, only the blunt pain of being unseen. This plainness, paired with her weary delivery, makes the song one of the more emotionally resonant moments. The sharpest turn comes with “Black Jade,” easily the album’s centerpiece. Jaleesa widens her lens from personal reflection to political indictment. “Blue lights, Black lives… White Lies” is stark and unmissable, a three-part refrain that lodges in memory. Verses sketch violence and grief: “No regards, you took a life like a thief in blue disguise” and “another mother weeps.” The bridge lands with force: “Is it too much to ask you to grant us human dignity? Should we be put down and shot to death for this request?” There’s no attempt to soften the language. The outro, repeating “Strip off your race, who are you now? Do you like who you are inside?” pushes the song into confrontation, demanding reflection and discomfort. Where some of her writing leans too far into vagueness, here her clarity becomes a blade, cutting clean and making a strong yet imperfect statement of identity that proves Jaleesa has a voice worth paying attention to.
She balances that heaviness with an interlude titled “An Ode to My Hair,” a compact self-celebration. “I love the skin I’m in, my melanin… It’s my crown and I wear it proud,” she sings, anchoring the affirmation in details of texture, bounce, and cocoa butter. The lyric is almost childlike in its simplicity, but the specificity makes it believable. It’s a smile captured in song, lightening the album’s atmosphere without breaking its thread of honesty. “Crystal Tears” pulls the listener back into the space of healing. “Hush now, oh darling, I see a sadness in your smile” sets the scene, and the chorus repeats like reassurance: “Dry your tears away, baby, just know that you are loved.” Performance-wise, it becomes one of the record’s most touching moments. Jaleesa sings with restraint, letting long notes stretch into the silence, never overselling. The repetition works because the message feels lived-in rather than borrowed. It is comfort without pretension. “Let Love In” continues the theme of healing: “Even though it’s hard, open your heart, love lives inside of you.”
The acoustic “Sonora Sunrise” offers more nuance by twisting a phrase: “Good morning sunrise, good mourning to I.” That simple pun folds hope and grief together, achieving more in one line than some of the album’s longer affirmations. It shows how effective she can be when she marries her directness with even a small flourish of poetry. That choice gives the album its strength but also exposes its flaws, as not every track holds up. “Rose Quartz” falters by relying almost entirely on the line “Your love won’t win if you don’t give it a try.” The repetition drains its force, and the song feels like a demo idea that has been extended too far. “I Am Enough” closes the record with “Just know that you’re enough, all you need is just a little love.” It’s undeniably sincere, and sincerity is the record’s spine, but it reads like an affirmation app. The songs are consistently warm and cohesive, leaning into soulful arrangements and velvety textures, yet the lyrics at times drift into oversimplification. This exposes the limits of Jaleesa’s decision to write without analogy. When the lines land, they cut deep. When they don’t, they collapse into platitudes.
Even with these shortcomings, Jaleesa’s voice and the album’s consistent arrangements keep Sodalite afloat. She has a supple tone that can be hushed, velvety, and raw with grit. Her restraint often works in her favor; she prefers to draw the listener in rather than belt over them. The retro-styled neo-soul production stays cohesive, creating a warm, safe atmosphere in which she can deliver both confrontation and consolation. One might wish for more sonic variation, but the consistency makes sense for a record meant to be a sanctuary. As a debut, it accomplishes its goal. She succeeds in creating a space of honesty and reflection, though she doesn’t always avoid the pitfalls of oversimplification. The album resonates most when her plain language is tied to vivid images or urgent themes. When it drifts into slogans, it loses power. Still, the overall impression is of a promising debut that, though imperfect, feels genuine and purposeful.
Great (★★★★☆)
Favorite Track(s): “Black Jade,” “Let Love In,” “Your Light”