Gallant has never been shy about his major label experience. Plagued by changing personnel at Warner Bros. Records, his 2019 sophomore album (and second for the label) Sweet Insomnia suffered creative conflicts that left nobody happy. Warner was gracious enough to release the DC-born artist from his contract one album early, and in 2021, Gallant resurfaced with the self-released and more self-assured Neptune EP. His rejuvenated spirit lives on on his third LP Zinc., which he views as a do-over of Sweet Insomnia. Here, he continues to ride the momentum of creative freedom, cresting at a height he hasn't reached since debuting with Ology in 2016. Even Zinc.'s quietest moments (and there are plenty) flow with renewed vitality.
Zinc. boasts Gallant's hallmarks. "Monorail." burbles and sputters along, its submerged beat phasing in and out, as if it wants to break out into full-blown footwork. Electric guitar cascades on "Lucid.," while "Fly on the Wall." and "Sticks and Stones." are lightly dappled with acoustic guitar. And where Sweet Insomnia leaned heavily on guest features, including a career-standout collaboration with the iconic Brandy, Zinc. only makes room for one other, but it's an exquisite choice, too: London singer-songwriter-producer NAO. And of course, Gallant's signature falsetto remains as soul-stirring as ever.
Despite a song like "Monorail.," overall, Zinc. is Gallant's subtlest work yet. Absent is the bubbliness of songs like "Comeback," "Third Eye Blind." "Julie." and "Miyazaki." And whereas Gallant generally floats in a high register vocally and instrumentally (hear the elated "Chemical Romance."), Zinc.'s most skillfully executed quality is its focus on atmospheric textures. They bind the new songs like connective tissue, a touch more delicate than most, if not all, of Gallant's other work. The glitchy R&B of Ology, specifically, created sonic crevasses into which his voice dropped and echoed, but on Zinc., he fills in all the would-be-empty spaces with ambient elements that blend with and bolster his voice.
Despite Gallant's newfound freedom, there's always healing to do. He spends Zinc. grappling with inter-and-intrapersonal conflicts. "Centigrade.," on which NAO acts as his foil, stews in the solitary reflective moment immediately after two arguing people go their separate ways. On the future-funk jam "Atoms.," he shoulders the burdens of being wrongful accused and having to fix other people's problem. "Fly on the Wall (Osaka Version)" begs for forgiveness over remarks he made in the heat of an argument. "How could I be so careless with my bottom lip?" he asks himself before vowing, "If I could do it again, I'd say, 'Please don't mind me.'" "Lucid.," written during the depths of a depressive spell drowned in beer and mindless television, finds Gallant gasping for air as apathy takes hold. "Maybe ignorance is bliss," he posits in a plaintive voice backed by subdued beats, a cocktail that recalls Frank Ocean's isolated, nocturnal ruminations.
Zinc. is Gallant's grandest work yet, but it's also his most understated and unhurried album. Unfettered and free to indulge in his instincts, whether going high and hard or low and slow, he sounds alive, surer than ever about himself, who he wants to be, and maybe more importantly at this juncture, who he doesn't want to be.