Malcolm Todd has been one of my favorite artists ever since a close friend recommended his songs last year. His “Sweet Boy” was the first album that had me hooked. Now exactly a year later, I got to listen to his recent self-titled album, “Malcolm​ Todd.”

After Todd first teased a snippet of “Chest Pain (I Love)” on his social media platforms, it started going viral through a TikTok trend of people showing things that they love. He officially released the song as a single on Dec. 4, 2024, which caused his popularity to skyrocket. 

Two days after Todd announced the upcoming release of “Malcolm Todd,” he also separately released “Bleed (feat. Omar Apollo).” These two releases had me looking forward to the rest of the songs that would be included in his new album.

When the first song of the album played, it instantly stood out to me. Titled “Harry Styles,” the song is about Todd’s struggles with popularity, essentially not being a “Harry Styles.” The guitar’s notes pieced the song together, which is something that has made Todd’s music special to me. The instrumentals that flow throughout every song never fail to catch my attention.

After listening to the album, most of the songs’ lyrics were personal to him — some of them being different from a “typical” song — which includes verses, melodies and an outro. “Make Me a Better Man” and “Florence” included lyrics that were more relatable to a broader audience. I usually enjoy concentrating on generally relatable lyrics, but the beats and melodies alone were more than enough to make up for the lyrics inapplicable to my life.

Every song was worth the wait. There was enough variation combined with unique songs to keep me entertained. There’s one song that is different from the rest, clearly distinctive and personal to Todd, that lasts only one minute, containing three lines. The first line and title being something that I would tell him myself:

“Good job, Malcolm.”