Mac Miller - Circles review

The Guardian 80

(Warner)
Circles continues Miller’s searching musical journey, adding elements of soft rock, pop and more to emo-rap: the result is beguiling and natural

Mac Miller died in September 2018, just weeks after releasing his fifth album, Swimming. A languid and lightly funky rap record, it combined rich, sophisticated neo-soul-inflected instrumentals with lyrics more in tune with the burgeoning emo-rap scene, a place where heartbreak, drug addiction and mental ill-health act as the foundations for painfully relatable superstardom. Miller – who made his name in the early 2010s with laddy “frat-rap”, before graduating to more winning, introspective fare – was well-versed in all three: open about his struggles with depression; when he died of an overdose, Miller had recently split with his girlfriend, pop star Ariana Grande.