Jordan Rakei & Nubya Garcia, Monsters Review

By Stamish Malcus

Finding this single and pressing play with AirPods in, I expected “Monsters” to be a strong collaboration between Jordan Rakei and Nubya Garcia. What was unexpect was how quickly the track would stop sounding like a collaboration and start sounding like a conversation.

Before a groove is established, before Rakei enters with that warm, soulful vocal, Garcia’s saxophone emerges through a cloud of delay carrying a bluesy, almost folk-like melody. It’s rubato. Unhurried. Curious. The sound drifts into view rather than announcing itself. When the rhythm section begins to form beneath it, the music takes on an unique vibe.

Then the groove lands. Not with a dramatic entrance. With a pulse. Florence Moore’s bass settles into low-register figures that leave plenty of breathing room before climbing upward through melodic fills, while Sam Jones shapes the pocket with relaxed confidence. The rhythm isn’t merely supporting the composition; it’s creating the atmosphere. The deeper I got into the track, the more obvious it became that rhythm is the real driving force behind Monsters. The mood, the sensuality, the sense of forward motion, it all grows from the groove.

Rakei’s voice arrives with a warmth that will immediately get your attention. At first, one hears elements of Sade, not because the timbre is identical, but because of the same effortless intimacy. There’s a soulful ease to his phrasing, a conversational quality that lets the melody settle naturally into the groove. His upper register remains strong without ever becoming forceful, and the performance feels inviting rather than attention-seeking.

But what makes “Monsters” special isn’t the vocal alone. It’s what happens around it. As Rakei sings, Garcia continues weaving variations of her original melodic idea. Background vocals enter. Keyboard figures begin moving independently. Piano chords descend through the texture. Suddenly several musical conversations are happening at once. The saxophone isn’t accompanying the vocal. The vocal isn’t dominating the saxophone. The keyboards aren’t simply filling space.

Everybody is participating. Everybody has a role. And it all fits. The track’s defining characteristic is counterpoint. Not the academic kind that sends listeners reaching for theory textbooks, but the kind that emerges when independent voices interact naturally. Garcia’s saxophone maintains its thematic presence throughout much of the piece, creating dialogue with the lead vocal. Harmony vocals develop ideas of their own. Rhodes and piano parts move around the melody instead of reinforcing it directly. Even the bass and drums contribute commentary through subtle rhythmic shifts and evolving groove relationships.

What is fascinating is how little interest anyone seemed to have in stealing the spotlight. In lesser collaborations, that might be a weakness. Here, it’s the source of the magic. Deeper into the performance, one thought kept returning: Everyone is listening. That’s the secret hiding inside “Monsters.”

You can hear it in the way Garcia responds to Rakei’s phrasing. You can hear it in the way the rhythm section leaves space instead of filling every available moment. You can hear it in the arrangement itself, which continually expands and contracts as though the musicians are reacting to one another in real time.

The saxophone solo provides an example. A subtle variation signals its arrival, but Garcia doesn’t suddenly transform the track into a showcase for technical virtuosity. Instead, she follows the emotional contours already established by the vocals. The solo remains soulful and melodic, occasionally leaping across multiple octaves but never abandoning the conversational spirit of the piece. Even here, the performance feels collective. It’s simply the next sentence in the discussion.

Meanwhile, Jones becomes increasingly active behind the kit, introducing more snare activity and rim-shot textures that energize the groove without disrupting it. Moore continues balancing spaciousness with movement, grounding the music while creating melodic interest. Beneath everything, the harmony remains remarkably simple. Modal. Open. Uncomplicated. And that’s exactly the point.

The sophistication of “Monsters“doesn’t come from dense harmonic language. It comes from interaction. From texture. From groove. From hearing multiple independent voices coexist without competing.

Midway through the track, the ensemble strips everything back to layered vocals. The harmonies create a repetitive, almost folk-like communal chant that briefly changes the emotional temperature of the recording. Then the rebuild begins. First the saxophone. Then drums. Then bass. Then additional vocal layers. Piece by piece, the conversation resumes.

It’s one of the track’s most effective moments because it demonstrates how carefully the arrangement moves. Nothing feels rushed. Nothing feels forced. Layers arrive when they’re needed and disappear when they’re not.

By the closing section, Garcia returns to variations of the melody that opened the piece. The groove relaxes. The texture thins. The music slowly circles back toward where it began. Even as the arrangement winds down, the sense of collective purpose remains intact.

Garcia listens to Rakei. Rakei listens to the rhythm section. The rhythm section listens back. The arrangement expands, contracts, and rebuilds because the musicians are responding to one another rather than merely executing parts on a chart.

That’s what gives “Monsters” its soul. Jordan Rakei, Nubya Garcia, Florence Moore, and Sam Jones offer something far more rewarding. They don’t simply share a recording. They create a living musical conversation shaped by groove, trust, counterpoint, and collective listening.

The result isn’t just a successful collaboration. It’s evidence of what collaboration actually sounds like.