After nearly two years of silence, QEERAN steps back into the frame with โCLOSER/HARDER,โ and it doesnโt feel like a comeback so much as a deliberate reintroduction. Based in Melbourne, the artist returns sounding sharper, darker, and far more self-aware, channeling a period of withdrawal, healing, and reinvention into an alternative R&B track that lives in the tension between intimacy and control. This isnโt music made to chase trends; itโs music shaped by lived-in stillness, late nights, and hard internal reckonings.
โCLOSER/HARDERโ opens submerged in deep bass, buzzing with glitchy, glistening synths that hum like neon lights flickering at 3 a.m. The beat pulls you inward, heavy with atmosphere and restraint. QEERANโs high, airy voice slips in slowly, soulful and sensual, floating just above the electronic weight beneath it. He sings measured, deliberate, like heโs choosing what to reveal and what to withhold. Thereโs vulnerability here, but itโs guarded, wrapped in warped velvet vocal layers and subtle distortion that blur pleasure and unease.
As the track unfolds, the production starts to feel unstable in the best way. Trap-influenced drums hit hard, then pull back, creating a push-and-pull dynamic, mirroring that emotional volatility and slow-burning sensual pleasure. Just when the song feels settled, it fractures. A sudden switch-up shifts the energy entirely, slowing everything down into a hazy, almost suspended outro. The beat drop and key change feel like an internal collapse. It comes off heavy and clarifying, as you have just buzzed out of a subliminal.
Influences from artists like Brent Faiyaz, Alina Baraz, Ama Lou, and 070 Shake linger in the minimalist textures and intimate vocal tone, but QEERANโs identity cuts through clearly. Entirely self-produced, mixed, and mastered, the track feels intentional to its core, every silence and distortion placed with purpose.
โCLOSER/HARDERโ thrives in the in-between spacesโbetween pain and pleasure, closeness and distance, who you were and who youโre becoming. Itโs dark R&B confronts, lingers, and reshapes the room long after it ends.
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Review by: Naomi Joan