More Is More

At the turn of the last century, contemporary R&B entered a second adolescence. The power ballads of the 1990s were fading out, replaced by crossover hits that pushed the limits of the genre by incorporating dance, electro, and hip-hop into visions of a glittering future. The 28-year-old singer George Riley was born as this cultural transition kicked off—and her new mixtape, the shiny, upbeat, slightly irreverent More Is More, makes a close study of early ’00s pop. Riley shuffles through retro sounds faster than a TRL lineup, combining rich vocals and radio-ready choruses with a dancefloor-oriented edge. A love letter to the work of producers like Dallas Austin, Darkchild, Jermaine Dupri, and Timbaland, More Is More takes their chopped-up acoustic guitar samples and house-indebted synths—elements that still sound innovative—and blasts them into the present.

Riley’s performances supply the vitality and wit that’s quickly become her trademark among the UK’s most exciting new R&B voices. She arrived on the scene barely four years ago, lending her breathy soprano to Manchester producer Azn’s ebullient dance track “You Could Be”; her 2022 Vegyn-produced breakthrough, Running in Waves, showed a softer side, marrying jazz and soul influences with jungle and electro flourishes. Earlier this year, she stepped into the role of UK garage diva on SHERELLE’s acidic 2-step track “Freaky (Just My Type).” These releases set her up as a fan favorite and critical darling, but More Is More is, well, more: bolder, grander, and musically tighter than anything she’s released thus far.

Riley makes no attempt to hide her influences or to couch them in anything but fervent appreciation. By her own admission, opener “Something New” borrows heavily from All for You-era Janet Jackson; its bubbly, tropical beat and skittering hi-hats recall “Someone to Call My Lover,” a song that’s recently led the Y2K R&B revival trend on TikTok. Riley goes deeper, kicking off a full-bodied garage beat in the middle of the track that gives it just enough bite to set it apart from 2001 Janet. The relentlessly catchy “Forever” twists the hypnotic synth pulse of Kylie Minogue’s megahit “Can’t Get You Out of My Head” into a beachy love song, a rising tide of Spanish guitars and sultry harmonies sloshing at Riley’s feet. Produced by Mura Masa, “Forever” is the best example of More Is More’s mission to tweak massively recognizable sounds just enough to transform them.

The majority of the tape is co-produced by phil, a main collaborator of another UK artist known to wield ’00s nostalgia to her advantage: PinkPanthress. Riley is more of a purist though, dissecting the music of her youth to find the sweet spot between homage and reinterpretation. She distinguishes her point of view with lyrics about self-love and agency, innermost wants and desires. Coupled with the uplifting music, the tone is fresh and galvanizing. “More,” co-produced by phil and Jordan Riley (no relation), pairs this approach with a musical nod to ’00s British girl groups. “Gold on gold on gold on brown skin/Some say it’s tacky, but I love it,” she sings, sounding like the fifth member of All Saints or a lost Sugababe. The sunny guitar riff echoes the theme of joy and abundance by evoking an era of sugary acoustic bubblegum that offered itself at face value. Riley takes it to the club: Just before the coda, “More” explodes into a jittery garage breakdown. Her novel engagement of established sounds anchors the music in the present.

Though it’s reference-heavy, More Is More doesn’t feel as if Riley were singing into a hairbrush, imitating some legendary act. Yes, she expounds on the mixtape’s themes through imaginative songwriting and production, but it’s her contagious excitement that takes the tape well beyond a lesson in fond reminiscence. By consistently delivering on a dense concept with songs that live up to the material they crib from, Riley proves she’s ready to carry the torch for the R&B and UK dance sounds that she reveres.