Until recently, Kevin Rhomberg was a relatively behind-the-scenes force on the Chicago indie hip-hop scene. As Knox Fortune, Rhomberg has produced for Joey Purp, Vic Mensa, and Towkio, but it wasn’t until last year with an outright feature on Chance the Rapper’s Coloring Book that his name began to hold enough weight to crack a headline. Now that he’s just released his debut, Paradise, a round of high-profile interviewers have been forcing the rotely burning question: “What was it like to work with Chance the Rapper?” they all ask.
Rhomberg’s voice on “All Night”—that happy, jukey Chance the Rapper dance track he featured on and won a Grammy for in 2016—was peculiar enough to immediately wonder, “Who is this guy?” And Paradise crystallizes his peculiar pop appeal. The album squirms from indie rock to synth pop and back. Without recognizing his name, a lot of new fans wrongly assumed Rhomberg’s gender from the pitch of his voice. It’s not just the almost-alto range of his singing that lends Rhomberg a slightly bizarre quality; the thin plainness of his timbre can make him sound downright boyish. There’s no gravity to his voice to anchor a song, and so no matter the style, Paradise seems to constantly buzz around in a summery daze.
Despite his previous production and Chicago affiliations, Paradise is anything but rap. Instead, the album dances around a core of quaint, shimmering synth-pop and indie rock, stances that present Rhomberg as a playful and unbothered lead. Standout single “Lil Thing” is the best consolidation of his charm. An earworm with a blurry mix, it’s subtly funky, but like the rest of the record, it never bogs down in technical austerity. That the lyrics are so cooly quippy extends the effect. On the stuttering “Help Myself” a slinky bassline misdirects from the dainty guitar riff that peeks over the top of the mix. “I think she wants it, but doesn’t know how to say it/She squeeze my hand in the car when I slam on the breaks,” Rhomberg sings, letting that familiar moment of tense inertia explain a new couple’s burgeoning intimacy. He conjures up little scenes like this throughout Paradise without coddling them in context. If you’ve ever driven a car with a loved one in the passenger seat, you know exactly what he means.
On “24 Hours,” a jumpy R&B pop track that sounds like a recycled Robin Thicke reference, Rhomberg feigns some pop star arrogance before disarming it away. “Accentuate my ego, yeah I’m the man,” he sings, trying to convince himself as much as his lover. Later he admits, “I’m a man to my mother, but afraid of the dark.” It’s not the only lyric on Paradise that might elicit an “aww.”
“I Don’t Wanna Talk About It” is the closest thing to Rhomberg leaning into the mic, and it sounds like he’s jumping around a garage trying out a psych-rock rendition with his friends. “Keep You Close” seems like the most forward crossover attempt. It’s a happy banger with a hint of edge and radio-friendly production: a theme-song worthy piano riff plods over a snappy drum break. “I need you to love me when I won’t/The one thing I’ll stress the most is/I’ll keep you close,” Rhomberg sings, turning his self-doubt into a love story.
All of this seems to come easily to Rhomberg. Never do you get the sense that he’s trying too hard or stretching his limits. Of course, there’s a potential downside to that light-footedness, and it’s fair to wonder what he might sound like as an aggressive auteur. But that Rhomberg doesn’t seem to take himself too seriously is his greatest asset. Much bigger pop stars strain to sound so passionately breezy. Even when he’s not trying anything new, Rhomberg just sounds like himself.
