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GIVEON at 2023 Governors Ball Music Festival
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Key Takeaways:
- GIVĒON shared the ‘BELOVED’ tracklist in a letter that reads like a breakup note.
- The letter embeds each song title in emotional reflections, offering insight into the album’s deeper themes.
- Previously released singles “RATHER BE” and “TWENTIES” preview the album’s introspective and narrative-driven style.
GIVĒON is releasing his sophomore album, BELOVED, on July 11, and on Tuesday (July 1), he revealed the official tracklist through a letter, of all things.
“It’s strange how certain memories cling like MUD — messy, uncomfortable and impossible to forget,” the note begins, with each of the 14 song titles written in all caps. “And still, I think of you and realize I’d RATHER BE in that chaos again than pretend it meant nothing.” Later, he reflects, “We thought we had it all figured out in our TWENTIES, but we were just STRANGERS with familiar souls trying to matter to someone.”
Judging by the letter, the LP’s opening cut, “MUD,” will explore the lingering emotional mess left behind by a love gone wrong. Thankfully, not everything is left to interpretation. Fans have already heard “RATHER BE” and “TWENTIES,” two singles released ahead of the project. On the former, which dropped in May, the “Time” artist admits he’d rather “be a fool” and embrace the chaos of an old flame than pretend there’s no connection there. The latter offering, as the name suggests, revisits the wreckage of love during the titular decade.
“I was NUMB to so much back then… but I CAN TELL now what I couldn’t admit then: I loved you more than I ever said. If I could, I’d leave DIAMONDS FOR YOUR PAIN — something beautiful to make up for all the ways we failed each other,” GIVĒON continued. From what we can tell (pun very much intended), the first two songs here seem to center on how emotionally detached he once was before finally understanding the weight of it.
“DIAMONDS FOR YOUR PAIN,” meanwhile, could be an acknowledgment of trying — and probably even failing — to redeem himself through gestures. The letter goes on to read, “You were always the KEEPER of the best parts of me, even when I didn’t know how to hold onto you. Now it’s SIX THIRTY in LA and I’m thinking about how some things in life don’t come with a BACKUP PLAN — especially in love.”
Toward the end of the letter, the writing starts to lean heavier. “Still, I feel the BLEEDING edges of what we lost. Even when you said DON’T LEAVE, deep down I already knew our time had run its course,” GIVĒON pens. “Maybe we were just an AVALANCHE waiting to happen — beautiful and destructive. Still, I’ll always carry the GOOD, BAD, AND UGLY of us with me.”
From the sound of it, “AVALANCHE” might capture exactly what the metaphor suggests: a love story that was bound to crumble eventually. As for the closer, “GOOD, BAD, AND UGLY,” there may not have been a more fitting way to end both the LP and letter. By now, hopefully GIVĒON will have fully accepted every part of the relationship without trying to rewrite history.
Luckily, we won’t have to wait much longer to see exactly what each of the song titles means. BELOVED hits streaming platforms on July 11.