On Through the Wall, Rochelle Jordan is a diva of the after‑hours, with control like Janet and poise like Diana Ross. Big hair, noir lighting, diamonds catching low light—she’s grounded, unhurried. “Don’t be afraid to take up space,” she earnestly declares at the start of “On 2 Something.” Across 17 sensorial tracks, the mood is intimate and dusky, luxurious and hypnotic; you can feel the velvet rope unhooking from the stanchion. It’s the right setting for an album that treats dance music as a space for composure and desire, and pop as the chariot that gets you there.
The British Canadian artist’s third album doesn’t reinvent her wheel so much as buff the rims to a mirrored sheen: It’s a late-night, pop-forward dance record engineered for people who like to move as good as they think. Through the Wall doubles down on a sound Jordan already dominates—house music with pop polish and R&B steering—while making the case that polish can also be a kind of risk. It’s less about futurist shock than present clarity: controlled tempos, velvet hooks, and a vocal style that prefers precision to pyrotechnics. If her peers (Kelela, Dawn Richard, FKA twigs, George Riley, Nia Archives) still bend the form until it squeals, Jordan’s flex is subtler—she keeps the party at a low boil and wins on consistency.
In 2021, Jordan made a return to the scene on Play With the Changes, a jam-packed attempt to prove herself in a crowded house. Through the Wall opens the windows. The tempos glide; the drums are sculpted; her voice—low, cool, assured—reserves her honeyed falsetto for the sweetest escapes. Jordan’s third album makes a confident argument for mid-tempo dance music that’s deep rather than eruptive. These songs don’t chase the weird for its own sake; they favor a steady after‑midnight sway that invites you closer, then closer still, until you’re inhaling the same smoke. There’s no doubt that Through the Wall feels akin to ’90s R&B dance pioneers like Janet Jackson, but for fans of contemporary groovesters, you may place this record in the same camp as those from Jessie Ware, Amber Mark, or even Victoria Monét.
Jordan is a master of restraint and subtle expression. She doesn’t belt; she breathes, trusting her phrasing to carry the heat. On the sugary highlight “Sweet Sensation,” she slips out of Brandy-esque melisma to assert that smolder can stand alone. On “Crave,” a love song produced by Chicago house legend Terry Hunter, Jordan struts exquisitely; club music was always about feeling as much as stimulation, and Jordan is tapped into the heart of its lineage. Songs like “Crave,” “TTW,” and “Sum” keep steady four-to-the-floor rhythms that invite slink, not sprint.
The record’s polish comes from curation as much as performance. Jordan doesn’t just hire producers; she maps a dance diaspora of contemporary pop, Chicago and Detroit house, and UK garage, and threads herself through it. Standout favorite “Bite the Bait” gets a chrome‑sleek electro sheen from Jimmy Edgar that lets her cool vocal glide like lip gloss; “Around” draws on producer Hamdi’s UK bass sensibility, and Jordan rides the low end, sounding featherweight and self-assured. “I’m Your Muse” sharpens her chanteuse era into a point. Over KLSH and Machinedrum’s lithe kick, she purrs instructions, blurring ad‑lib and hook until the whole thing feels like an invitation and a boundary at once: “Just say you love me/Say you use me/Say you’re feening.” Elsewhere, KLSH keeps the pulse clean (“Ladida,” “Never Enough”), and the snap of Machinedrum and WaveIQ’s beat for “On 2 Something” gives her space to flirt in the margins. Jordan’s scene knowledge reads lived-in, not borrowed, and her voice remains the constant center of gravity.
If you come craving rupture or the feral edge of club experimentalism, you might want to look elsewhere. There are moments—especially for fans of her more edgy cuts—where you expect the veneer to crack. But the choice here is deliberate: restraint as seduction, control as heat source. Through the Wall makes its case without grandstanding, proof that command can be quiet. Jordan has always balanced sultry R&B with a steady impulse steeped in UK dance; the difference now is how serene she sounds in these choppy waters. Through the Wall isn’t the loudest record in the room, but it’s among the most replayable at 2 a.m.—and by that time, it’s only true party people in the house.
