Review: Yung Lean "Jonatan"

I'll let you in on a secret: I did not expect to consider myself a Yung Lean fan. For some reason, I never checked out the Swedish rapper's music until recently, when I began to hear his name dropped by artists I love from several different genres and corners of the internet. Then, when I saw his 2022 collab track "Bliss" with FKA Twigs pop up on my Spotify, I had to give it a listen. Soon, I was hooked on his introspective, dreamy and nostalgic rap tracks (known in the subgenre "cloud rap") such as "Hennessy and Sailor Moon," "Yoshi City," "Highway Patrol," and "Summertime Blood" (feat. Skrillex, Bladee, and Ecco2k). They've become my go-to songs for whenever I need to hype myself up, whether I'm riding on a long train commute to work, getting ready to go out, or motivating myself to do chores around the house. I was excited to hear more of Yung Lean's signature style when I heard he was releasing a new album. Yet, Jonatan surprisingly abandons much of his electronic, video-game-soundtrack-meets-trap aesthetic, instead pairing his laid-back energy with grungy guitar riffs and frayed, elongated vocals. And it works really well.

Yung Lean aficionados may be less surprised than I was by these generic shifts, as this project seems to serve as a synthesis of two personas under which he's released music: "Yung Lean" and "jonatan leandoer96." While Jonatan Aron Leandoer Håstad found viral success on SoundCloud under the moniker Yung Lean, jonatan leandoer96 creates more orchestral ballads that suggest a willingness to experiment with genre and form beyond what may be commercially acceptable as rap music.

The opening track, "Jonatan Intro," true to its name, serves as a reintroduction to the artist. The cascades of violins opening the album immediately signal a dramatic genre shift and would sound out of place alongside his other work. After the almost wordless orchestral opening of string instruments paired with heavy synths, "Might Not B," the second track, helps consolidate the sound of the rest of the album.

"Don't go wasting your emotions / Lay all your love on me."

"Jonatan" is immediately hazier, slower, and sonically more expansive than much of his previous work. Elements of slacker rock, more classical instrumentation, and layered humming or choruses of backing vocals create a bold new sound for Lean. The initial tracks rely less on electronic bass and beats for impact and instead explore a wide range of more fluid grounding and backing sounds. In terms of the lyrics, he seems to be returning to his 'sadboy,' emo-tinged roots, but with markedly more mature and poetic compositions.

The tone and tempo shift between "Might Not B" and "Forever Yung" also does a lot of work to convey the shifting sound of the album. Jonatan oscillates between acoustic and electronic sounds, upbeat and fatalistic moods, while abandoning most hip-hop elements of his previous albums in favor of his new rock sound.

The buzzy, grunge guitar riffs of "Horses" and "My Life" pair well with the raw-sounding vocals. What's stranger is how effortless the infusion of folk rock and drawling vocals comes across, as if this were the music he's made all along.

"Like a wild horse, yeah / You'll never catch up to what I do (you'll never catch up to what I do / Wish that I could stay, but I gotta leave / Baby, you know a wild horse gotta run free (run free)

All dreams must come alive, then die / I smell the wind of change inside"

Lean here appears to self-reflect on his growth and his refreshing refusal to capitalize on the trends he helped to popularize in the electronic-rap game (now that they have found mainstream success), prioritizing his own growth as an artist over fan service. Rolling Stone Phillipines likewise calls Jonatan a "necessary break from expectation. While many artists calcify under the pressure of branding and streaming metrics, Yung Lean veers towards risk and refusal. Jonatan might alienate casual fans, but it cements Lean’s position as an artist unwilling to coast."

The best thing about his move from Yung Lean to "Jonatan" is that it doesn't sound like a rapper suddenly trying to prove he can do other things: it sounds like someone looking in the mirror after a long night of partying and coming to terms with himself. As he says on "Swan Song," between punctuations of trumpet and electronic synths: "'Cause I want to know what it feels like to come down/From the trip of a lifetime, pure ecstasy."

His earlier style comes through in the circularity and lullaby-esque sensibilities of "Paranoid Paparazzi," but with more precise, imagistic lyrics in his flows.

"Fed me with pills and lullabies every night / Dissolved in front of your enchanting thighs / You laughed manically with your green stoned eyes / The future now is not very far / Now you paint with fragments of a shattered heart / Played myself like I could play guitar / Every Desire Avenue has a new start"

Tracks like "Babyface Maniacs" see Lean self-stylized as a wounded, Western outlaw, as he passes through shifting terrains and genres, on the run from the law and perhaps his former self. It also happens to be my favorite track on the album.

"If I could be your lazy in-love killer / Babyface maniacs in a four-wheeler / Infamous, murderous couple ridin' through the drylands (Drylands) / Sugarcane kisses and shotguns, candy cane violence (Violence) / If you die, then I die, then it's my time (My time) / We go out shooting 'til it's our time"

"I'm Your Dirt, I'm Your Love" functions as a surprisingly earnest and sweet love song at the midpoint of the album. The track is another refreshing refusal to get overly tied up in the existentialism and examination of his own personas that come to the forefront as the album progresses in tracks like "Teenage Symphonies 4 God (God Will Only)."

"Changes" provides a reintroduction of electronic beats and more recognizable raps. However, even here, the punctuations of "get money!" from a backing chorus sound more like a cheeky throwback to his earlier aesthetic rather than a command. "Terminator Symphony" is the most explicitly rap track on the album, yet here Lean's rhythm and diction are sharp and commanding rather than chill and mumbling.

Another immediate shift occurs in the transition to the slower, more acoustic "Lessons from Above" to close out the album. The finale circles back to "Intro" by featuring someone yelling "Jonatan" with the same heavy electronic vocal distortion. In this way, the album opens and closes with a stamp featuring his given name and raw feelings versus his previous tags, which highlight a chosen persona he may be shedding.

If I had one complaint or caution regarding Jonatan, while I don't feel the insertion of certain spiritual considerations detracts here, I would hate to see the appeals made to God become excessive in future albums or be the predominant theme of his next work. I would not even mention this here if this did not seem to be a trap several male rappers or musicians have fallen into of late. Yet, with Lean's penchant to be a surprising and chimera-like figure within the music scene, I am not too worried.

Overall, Jonatan is a tight, intentional album that also manages to maintain the chill, meandering circularity of his earlier work on several tracks. This is definitely one of my favorite releases of 2025, so far.