boy
I heard 2hollis song jeans on TikTok and really liked what I heard, I was super intrigued to look into his discography and settled on “boy”
So, ‘boy’ is the second full album from ElectroPop artist 2hollis. He’s got a lot of ambition, but sometimes it feels like he’s trying a bit too hard to prove something. Like, take ‘you once said my name for the first time’—honestly, one of the best songs I’ve heard this year. It’s got these super emotional lyrics and the synths are crazy good, really pulling you into this sad story about losing someone. But then you get to ‘mountain,’ the last track, and it just kinda falls flat. It feels like all the consistency of the album just gets thrown out the window, leaving you feeling meh.
And yeah, I said "thrown out the window" on purpose because, let’s be real, this album was made for TikTok kids. It’s got that sad, Cloud Rap vibe mixed with some ElectroPop beats, but it ends up sounding like the most basic, personality-less Electroclash knockoff. I will say, though, I loved the beats on ‘teenage soldier’ and ‘two bad,’ and I legit got pretty hype when I heard the Minecraft fireworks sound effect. But the problem is, his creativity kinda comes and goes, just like the waves on the album cover. ‘lie’ didn’t hit as hard as I expected, especially since it felt like it was inspired by Crystal Castles, and ‘sister’ and ‘say it again’ just try way too hard, resulting in this murky sound that’s hard to enjoy. ‘crush’ had potential with that beat—I thought it was gonna be some grunge-esc Electroclash banger, but it just turned into a bland Pop song that didn’t do much. Then there’s ‘3,’ which honestly might be my favorite song in his whole discog, mostly because it actually commits to its sound. And that’s the big issue: 2hollis just doesn’t fully embrace what he’s creating.
The production quality is kinda shaky, and I cant fully appreciate 2hollis because his singing is horrible, and his lyrics remind me of a teenage F-boy trying to be deep.
His vocals are super harsh on most of the tracks, to the point where I couldn’t even enjoy the songs for what they had to offer. ‘two bad’ is this weird mix of spoken word and, like, melodic rapping, and then there’s ‘crush,’ which overdoes the auto-tune to the point where it hurt my ears. ‘Promise’ takes a beautiful instrumental and ruins it with mumbled nonsense toward the end. Honestly, I wish he’d just let the instrumentals shine more because his synth work is AMAZING, but his vocals kill the vibe way too often. And let’s not even get started on the lyrics—they’re super basic and repetitive. ‘two bad’ and ‘sister’ basically follow the same formula, and I hate that cookie-cutter approach in electronic music. Then you have ‘lights,’ which is straight-up annoying. He’s over here singing “Play nice (Ooh), roll the dice/I've been losing my mind...” in this cheesy tone, then starts whining about having to walk up some stairs. Like, I guess it’s supposed to be a metaphor for breaking down emotional walls, but it honestly just sounds like he’s mad about doing cardio. And don’t even get me started on ‘sister,’ where he’s supposedly singing about how he never really loved his girlfriend. After saying he hasn’t loved her for years, he’s like, “So, honestly (Can you take a joke?),” as if it’s all just a big joke to him. It feels super shallow and lacks authenticity.
So yeah, there are some cool ideas here, but the execution is rough. If 2hollis wants to win me over, he needs to stop recycling the same electronic sound effects, commit to his sound, and write something that actually feels real. It kinda reminds me of ‘Nurture,’ but, like, the diet version. There’s some heart here, but it’s so badly written that I can’t fully appreciate what good he does bring to the table.
2HOLLIS - BOY
RATING - 6.3/10
FAVORITE TRACK - 3
GENRE - Edm, Grunge, Pop, Cloud Trap, Electronic, Synth