“Learn 2 Swim” Review

Redveil outdoes himself in everything he’s built his brand on, and he asks you to hold your nose as we dive into his junior project learn 2 swim.

My first ON THE RISE featured artist has just recently dropped his third project on 4/20, his 18th birthday. he has finally broken a million monthly listeners on Spotify. Completely upping the game from his last project Niagara, the Maryland native Marcus Morton improves on his strengths and lessens his weaknesses.

Unlike his past two pieces, learn 2 swim is completely cohesive and has a strong concept of growing and adapting into adulthood despite the challenges. What really stuck out to me was the strength of the production and the transitions into every consecutive song. This album really felt like one full melancholic song, with discernable pieces, which is why I think it’s so great. Even though it feels like it’s just one piece, you can tell the difference between each song and it’s not repetitive (except for the imagery).

He starts off strong with a great two-song intro in “together” and heads into a single he released about a month prior, “diving board”, both featuring his signature Avant-Garde jazz-rap style, in which he samples anything and everything. This somehow works and demonstrates the main repetition of swimming that is present throughout the project. I say these two count as a single intro because until you hear the first verse of “diving board” you don’t know that a new song started.

Bringing summer a little early Morton brings a banger in the form of “better” featuring Sam Truth. A sick vibey single with a very catchy chorus caught my ears when it was released before the album, and I feel like every album like this should have at least one of those kinds of songs.

Not only is the production and cohesiveness at new levels here, but the features and lyricism is on a completely different level as well. I thought some of the tracks on “Niagara” could do without a feature, but I don’t think there were many misses on this project. Some of the strongest songs, “automatic” and “better”, both have at least one feature. None of them take away from Morton’s bars and they all flow perfectly with the tone he’s trying to give off.

Obviously, there are still some shortcomings that are expected from a young artist. Some of the songs were definitely much weaker than others – not production-wise, but the chorus and verses don’t work exactly the way they should. Some of the notes sound just a bit off and aren’t very pleasing in my opinion, like the chorus on “shoulder” which hurts an otherwise very strong song. The same with the outro “working on it.” The chorus just doesn’t feel right to me personally.

I really recommend this album to anybody who wants to listen. Even though there are still some weak points that hold this album back from being an album of the year, this is a great step for a talented young artist and I think it’s only up from here.

Final stats:

7/10

Favorite tracks: “diving board”, “better”, “automatic”, “mars”

least favorite track: “working on it”