Khamari is becoming aware of the truth. The much-hyped R&B rising star is making news every day, but he just cares about his craft as a songwriter with an old soul who can combine R&B clichés with something quirky and distinctive to his voice. ‘A Brief Nirvana’ is a powerful debut full-length that is terse, poetic, and condensed.

Wax Poetic, a song that expressly discusses Khamari’s efforts to discover his voice, serves as the album’s opening track. I’ve had tongue-tie… Words “don’t come easy these days,” he sings in the song, which implies that artistry requires effort and isn’t something that comes naturally. Khamari, a stunning performer, turns things up on the sparse, acoustic-led “Doctor, My Eyes” before letting the electronic beat take back the foreground.

‘A Brief Nirvana’ is a tightly wrapped arc where each sound element has its place. It is a finely tuned and meticulously built record. Cherry Picking is a seductive song, while the melancholy “A Sacred Place” poses the hypothetical question, “What if I could make a believer out of you?”

“A Brief Nirvana,” a project that uses everything from a voice memo left by his grandfather to the newest technologies, seems to know when to reveal and when to keep things a secret. Compare the sing-along campfire charms of “Right My Wrongs” with the mellow and easy soul of “Tell Me,” for instance, while taking in a skillful interpolation of “Didn’t I” by Darondo.

Khamari is at his graceful best on ‘On My Way,’ a palate cleanser before the potent finale ‘Requiem,’ even though ‘These Four Walls’ may offer rough, uncompromising introspection. ‘A Brief Nirvana’ is a work of genuine astonishment and promise in which this Boston-born artist struggles to assert his independence. Instead of focusing on the current trend of long, features-focused albums, he focuses on his own creative ambitions; a work of rebellion, ‘A Brief Nirvana’ is a brilliant introduction.