As a way to reconnect with his producer and songwriter side and an exploration of diversity, Jensen Gomez releases part two of his Phases trilogy of EPs entitled Phases Volume 2.
Containing three tracks, the EP is a collaborative effort between Jensen himself and neo-soul singer Dani Idea, rapper Switch of Assembly Generals, and R&B soul singer Seonna. The singer-songwriter called this project his “dream collaboration” as he was able to work with many of his friends.
“I think I did it with this whole album, since I did it all dito sa bahay, so I had the freedom to collaborate with whoever I want. Madami akong kaibigan kinontact for this,” he said.
Described as “sonically more bouncy” than its predecessor, Phases Vol. 1, Phases Vol. 2 is an exploration of dance-pop, hip-hop and trap soul which aims to “make a statement.”
“The concept of Volume 2 is to highlight more of my producer side of things and my songwriter side rather than being the performer. It’s more of a statement that we wanted to put out. At this point, everyone’s attention span ay maliit because of social media, we really wanted people to look at what we are creating, kahit medyo mahirap siya,” he shared.
And make a statement they did. With the release of the first single, “Yas Queen,” a summery and yes, bouncy, 70s inspired bop about female empowerment, Phases Vol.2 certainly made quite an entrance. Performed by Dani Idea, the song is a testament to the strong women in Jensen’s life.
“I grew up with my mom and my two older sisters, and my dad was a seaman, so I grew up with women sa bahay. I wanted to write a song for them to give light to them,”
The single also came with several music videos, namely a live video, a lyric video, and a ballet dance video. According to Jensen, this was a way for them to represent every person, leaving the viewer to find whichever version of Dani Idea they put in the video to identify with.
“We tried to dress up Dani as iba-ibang tao, so we made a lot of videos for representation, so kung saan ka mas mag-identify with. And hopefully, we can put out more content for ‘Yas Queen’ for more diverse people. What we need now is a representation of different people, not just for girls,” he explained.
However, it is not just “Yas Queen” that played with the concept of diversity. As the project is also Jensen showing off his wide range of genres, he follows up “Yas Queen” with “From my Window,” where Switch spits out bars about watching life go by from a window that pounds and gets increasingly intense. Afterwards, Seonna slows it down and closes the sound trip with the soft and romantic trap soul track, “Sprung.” All in all, Phases Vol. 2 is quite an impressionable ride from start to finish.
Jensen Gomez’s Phases Vol. 2 and “Yas Queen” is now available in all major streaming platforms.