GENRE: Pop/R&B
LABEL: Empire
REVIEWED: 2 October, 2025
RATING: 8.4/10
Rochelle Jordan’s third studio album, Through the Wall (2025), arrives as a late-night manifesto of emotional fortitude and dancefloor intimacy. Across its 17 tracks, Jordan weaves house, UK garage, and silky alternative R&B into a cohesive, intoxicating whole.
From the outset, Jordan leans into restraint over spectacle: her voice seldom soars but rather breathes, guiding rather than commanding. Pitchfork praises her “control like Janet and poise like Diana Ross,” noting how the album favors clarity over theatrical pyrotechnics. The Quietus similarly describes the production as “expensive … richer and more graceful” — synths “made of velvet,” hi-hats “cut glass.” It’s not bombastic, but it doesn’t need to be.
Highlights like “Crave” (co-produced with Chicago house legend Terry Hunter) and “Bite the Bait” showcase Jordan’s command of sensuality framed within danceable structures. “Crave,” in particular, turns relational tension into late-hour heat: “I need you to touch it… make me remember why we fell in love,” she coos over four-on-the-floor percussion. Meanwhile, “Doing It Too” invokes UKG rhythms, and “Sweet Sensation” leans into retro-funk polish, straddling the line between nostalgia and reinvention.
Lyrically, Jordan balances empowerment, spiritual uplift, and vulnerability. “TTW,” the title track, is framed as a mantra of perseverance, a dedication both to self and faith. Even more introspective moments, like “Eyes Shut,” question the dopamine highs of modern life (“Got dopamine and can’t feel my soul”) without abandoning groove.
That said, the album’s polish sometimes renders its individual tracks less distinct from one another. As The Quietus warns, some songs may “distinguish themselves less conspicuously than the rest.” Still, this is not a flaw so much as a stylistic choice: the consistency becomes its own virtue.
Through the Wall doesn’t roar it whispers, glides, insinuates. It is boldness born of cool confidence. In a field crowded with dance-R&B hybrids chasing the next high, Rochelle Jordan stakes space through nuance, making the case that sometimes the most striking music is the kind that draws you in slowly—and stays with you.
