The Georgia-born, Los Angeles-based pop artist Terrell Hines returns today with a genre-bending new single “Who Do You Love?.” The track finds Hines offering a thoughtful meditation on the state of the world and the determination it takes to keep moving forward in hard times.
The track is the first single from Hines’ debut album, Polyglot, due out this summer. Hines, who has collaborated with artists like Beck and Vince Staples, often mixes several genres into one song, displaying a polymathic musicality honed in part through his studies on scholarship at Berklee College of Music.
Like much of Hines’ work, “Who Do You Love?” bubbles with energy, playfully blurring sonic borders. The song opens with a burst of electronics, giving way to psychedelic soul, tense funk, euphoric blues-rock, and gospel-pop anthemics, often combining many of these elements at once. All the while, Hines sings about an apocalyptic “war on earth” and the emotional journey people go through to transcend trying times. “So much going on can’t help myself,” he wails in the chorus. “If we’re all going down then what do you desire? I’ll take you higher.”
Though Hines’ debut album is in the works, he’s had a busy last few years. In 2020, he released his first tape Portal One: The Mixtape, a nine-track project that featured live instrumentation. In October, he followed that release with the electrifying “We’re All Gonna Be Killed” which reflected on “the tension of 2020 so far.”
In 2019, Hines appeared on the title track to Beck’s Hyperspace album and saw a major boost after his music was used during an Apple Keynote. This early success is only highlighted by “Who Do You Love?,” a worthy addition to his ever-shifting catalog. It’s only the first taste of Polyglot, but if “Who Do You Love?” is any indication, the album is sure to be jam-packed with unexpected thrills.
Terrell Hines’ “Who Do You Love?” is now available for purchase.