Kojey Radical's 'Don't Look Down' is the London Creative’s Poetically Immersive Image of Personal Growth and Musical Refinement
Evan Dale | September 19, 2025
Knock Knock, Kojey’s back, and something about his newest album’s opening track feels inescapably familiar. Not only is its poeticism structurally reminiscent to so many of the interludes and interjections that have sprinkled their way across the narrative frameworks of his prior releases – Mr. Radical’s roots as a rapper lie in poetry, after all – the very sentiment of the onomatopoeic introduction is transportive to a feeling most of us listeners can relate to in some sense or another. A quick escape from the noise of a party. As the door shuts to the bathroom – locking social interactions out – introspection rushes in to the mind’s forefront. A drink – maybe something else – have provided an ease with which thoughts flow more freely. So has the rushing of the sink and a stare into the mirror. A little taste of calm, and a little pep talk before a centered return to the merrymaking.
When the party’s back on – when Knock Knock comes to a close – Rotation feels equally resonant to a seasoned Kojey Radical listener. The groove-strewn production – momentarily transportive to the neo-funk immersion therapy that was his 2019 project, Cashmere Tears – guides its way towards our protagonist’s first true verse. Once there, there’s no mistaking the sound of Kojey Radical for another lyricist, past or present. In that sense – and in those unavoidable throughlines to his previous collections – Don’t Look Down often feels like a classic Kojey joint.
But in other ways, his first album since 2022’s Reason to Smile is a markedly unique chapter for the multi-hyphenate London-born creative. There’s always been an underlying bounce to Kojey’s poise – he’s too entrenched in his poetry to deliver it with anything but brash confidence – but he has also clearly grown. His wide-ranging delivery is – from the spoken-word and the lyrically astute to the chopped and screwed or the melodically bold – refined in a way that his vast and varied canon has always been building towards.
‘I wanted to make this album more personal and more honest,’ Kojey explained, ‘The goal was to feel empty by the time it was done. To say everything until there’s nothing left to say, and hope everyone is still there when I land. It took a lot to get to this level of vulnerability, but I wanted everyone to know that it’s okay to feel. To dance through hard times. To find pieces of joy in this world. And hopefully get a reminder of home by the time the party is done.’
Rule One – featuring Bawo – is an exhibition of one kind of that confidence both in its multitude of deliveries and in its subject matter. As a songwriter, Kojey Radical’s self-assurance, too, has expanded bountifully. At times – like overtop the bass-booming production of Don’t Look Down’s hardest hitting cut – Kojey’s braggadocio rises even above. At others – like in the immense vulnerability of the album’s closing track, Baby Boy – which folds in the sounds of Ghetts and Chrissi – that confidence shines a different kind of light born from experiences and maturity.
His lyrical prowess as a rapper is also clearly defined throughout Don’t Look Down with a countless cascade of well-placed references to classic hip-hop bars. If a listener is getting a hint of déjà-vu here and again, it’s very much intentional, and very much an ode to his roots as not only a rapper, but a student from the golden age of hip-hop to disco, grime, and jazz. Just one listen through the Mnek-tinged Drinking My Water and a listener is sure to catch a few allusions. Just one listen more and they’ll be immersed again in the downtempo, signature delivery that has long defined a swath of Kojey’s aesthetic.
Whether redolent yet refined or altogether something new, Kojey is putting on an exhibition of each and every corner of his artistry from Don’t Look Down’s very onset. Long Day – with a guest appearance from Dende – plays more in the latter camp. Kojey’s always been a romantic – and at times a suggestive musician – but Long Day is a proper attempt at crafting a babymaker.
‘Hold my paloma, I’ll be right back,’ his intermissionary dialogue leaves us in pursuit of a fictional interest before leading us into the album’s second act and beyond.
And just like in the album’s first, Kojey Radical tirelessly delves into the rangy whole of his auditory aesthetic, all the while crafting a reflection of his own lessons learned since his last album release – since some monumental personal changes, too. Loss and renewal, hedonism and celebrity, fatherhood and friendship, his is the lofty kind of thematic discourse that makes for an emotionally relatable listen for a broad populous of fans. Musically, it’s equally as broad.
There are jazz-infused cuts like Expensive – which also folds in the sound of Montreal hip-hop trio, Planet Giza – meandering through the struggles and pains of relationships. There is an emotional interluding verse, Communication, where Kojey gives nearly the entirety of his spotlight to Benjamin AD, before a short stanza of his own. The reflective and emotive ballad, Curtains – with a whole lot of melody from Solomon – where Kojey’s storytelling reaches new vulnerable peaks. Baby Boy – a love letter to his young son – where he does so again, albeit leaving the stamp on the album one of more upbeat tonality and hope for what’s next. There are more tracks than all the ones listed here, too, but at some point, you’ve simply got to listen for yourself.
What you’ll find, ultimately, is personal growth from Kojey Radical, in a way that – if you’ve been listening to his journey all along – perhaps feels parallel and relatable in some ways to your own life. And if not, what you’ll find is musical expansion and refinement, where a rapper that was already one of the most stylistically wide-ranging is now even more so, springboarding his personal growth into a musical expression that is uniquely boundless and cinematically immersive.
