Lilianna Kelly
Staff Writer
Brent Faiyaz’s Icon was released on Friday, Feb. 13, with the deluxe version hitting streaming platforms the following Monday, Feb. 16. Icon was set to release on Sept. 19, 2025, however Faiyaz delayed the release. His team had confirmed to Rated R&B that he had sent a group text message, scrapping the lead single and its video with it.
With “Have To” surfacing on Halloween, fans were finally given a sign that the album’s direction had shifted. With ten tracks and no features, Icon makes desire sound urgent.
“Have To” has earned its spot as surviving single, as earlier singles “Peter Pan” and “Tony Soprano” were removed from the tracklist following Faiyaz’s postponement of the album. In this single, Faiyaz pledges to “pack and ship myself if I have to,” showing a man incredibly desperate to close the distance between himself and the one he loves. As the song progresses, Faiyaz sings, “You my drug, you my plug through the storm, through the flood,” a line that collapses romance and dependency in one breath.
Each song approaches love from a slightly different angle. “Butterflies” is overflowing with anxiety. “Other Side” teems with the need to be constantly reassured. “Wrong Faces” addresses the urge to rescue someone who has not been loved properly in the past. Yet, despite the various ways Faiyaz describes love and desire in these songs, one statement remains true: Faiyaz loves to tell women what they need and how they can get it. These are beautiful tracks.
There is genuine protectiveness in his voice as Faiyaz sings, “I’ll be your reason to stay home,” in “Wrong Faces,” and you can almost feel the obvious admiration in “Butterflies,” as he calls his muse “Superwoman.” “Other Side” is wrapped in a falsetto that could melt glass, Faiyaz singing “You would never have to feel alone… You don’t have to deal with nothing on your own.”
For all of the beauty these songs hold, they are, at their core, a man writing the schedule for someone else’s life and calling it love.
“Strangers” tells us more about the central theme of this album more than any other track does. Faiyaz sings, “You was supposed to change your last name,” and, “I won’t explain a damn thing,” only lines apart, colliding in a way that sheds light on his purely transactional nature. He calculates the exchange rate on an already collapsed relationship, and he simply refuses to admit where he went wrong.
The closing track, however, is a strange and wonderful detour. A spoken list of self-improvement tips (be truthful, eat healthy, read books, give without expecting anything) are addressed to Faiyaz, spoken with the conviction of a performative-esque man who just got dumped and marched directly to the self-improvement section of a bookstore.
The tracks released in “Icon: Director’s Cut” were arguably some of the best on this album. “Full Moon (fall in tokyo) (Bonus)” balances romance and obsession, his voice flowing effortlessly over the beat. Faiyaz sings, “I wish that I could stay here for life,” and you can feel the pure elation of loving someone, the need to be tethered to them at all times.
This track is followed by “1 For You (spring in new york) (Bonus),” and it makes you nearly feel as though you’re levitating. This track highlights the lighter and more romantic aspect of love, while maintaining the velvety undertones of Faiyaz’s voice, a truly dreamy experience.
Icon possesses enough vocal precision and to carry 12 songs without a single guest in sight, yet the lyrics lack significantly. Though the breathtaking production nearly masks the repetition of this album, you cannot help but notice the recurring lines of each track.
If we’re being honest, Raphael Saadiq’s sensational production saved this album, giving Faiyaz room without cluttering him and keeping the album from floating into redundancy.