After discarding almost an entire album, the Australian artist chooses emotional sincerity as his compass: no video clip glitter, no radio slogans.
Just 18 tracks in which fame, anxiety, love and loss intertwine in a flow that should feel like real life.
The opening with Me + You it's a game of mirrors: bright and infectious soul-pop that hides lonely nights between luxury hotels. LAROI makes you smile and at the same time reminds you that celebrity is never neutral: it is a burden, an excess, a question of equations that never add up.
With July and Come Down the album veers towards a darker R&B, with almost trip-hop atmospheres, obsessive beats and lyrics that put doubts, fragility and emotional paranoia in the face. The echo of the eighties arrives in A Perfect Worlda piece that blends nostalgia and contemporary attitude, while Never Came Back stands as a stadium anthem, the moment in which LAROI's creative confidence emerges in all its energy.
Among the surviving tracks from the discarded sessions is I'm So In Love With Youbut the rest is the result of a total reset.
There is no shortage of calculated risks: the interpolation of Fix You in A Cold Play It's a gamble that might seem obvious, but in the end it's not a deal breaker. because LAROI is not afraid to test itself and play with expectations. The closing with Back When You Were Mine it is a solemn farewell, a reflection on loss and personal growth, which closes a coherent and powerful emotional circle.
“Before I Forget” is the sound diary of a young artist trying to find clarity within himself.
Between glamour. echoes of Justin Bieber and Justin Timberlake and isolation, success and vulnerability, LAROI builds an authentic path, where each song is a challenge, a creative risk and an attempt to understand oneself. It is an album that knows how to speak to young people without banality, with direct but never superficial language, and which highlights the emotional maturity behind early fame.
