It's beginning to look like there was an Anderson .Paak masterplan after all. After releasing one of the albums of the year (Malibu) and striking the right note on a clatter of collaborations, .Paak has found the headspace to finesse this record with NxWorries sidekick Knxwledge, a producer whose stock has soared in recent times on the back of work with Kendrick Lamar, Earl Sweatshirt and Joey Bada$$.
Yes Lawd! is an all-beats-blazing set of the funk, where both singer and producer get to show off their swagger. In the case of .Paak, the rhymes are soaked in shades of sepia familiar from Malibu, with some added gospel holler to bring righteous old-school soulmanship to the show.
Meanwhile, Knxwledge displays his nous as a producer who knows the many different right ways to treat and temper gnarly and bumpy source material, turning them into rough-cut gems such as Lyk Dis, Get Bigger and What More Can I Say. Praise the Lawd indeed.