Photo by Ben Chadourne

Navy Blue, the moniker of multi-disciplinary talent Sage Elsesser, has been working his way out from a head full of grief since the very start when his debut album, Àdá Irin, broke through the collage rap landscape back in 2020. More recently, clarity has begun to emerge in the patterns and the flow of his reflections set to a beat, and on “Orchards”, the Brooklyn wordsmith finally sounds like he’s able to stop, breathe and let the view sink in. “In the wake of what I lost, fell asleep to live a dream of mine,” he rhymes over tranquility piqued through Child Actor’s production of a trickling piano loop, drums softly palpitating, and a new age aura surrounding him. “Kept it bottled in / We were dealt so many losses that we gotta win.” This state of bliss is one of them.

Navy Blue’s The Sword & The Soaring will be released November 11th on Freedom Sounds.