During the 2010s, Steve Lacy became an in-demand producer thanks to his work with The Internet, the loose-knit funk collective who sprouted from the Odd Future hive mind. His world-building on The Internet’s third album, 2015’s Ego Death, led to his working with the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Solange and Kali Uchis, and his 2019 debut, Apollo XXI, announced his arrival as a solo artist, its stretched-out, emotionally resonant songs providing insight into the multi-instrumentalist’s wide musical influences and deep-seated feelings. Eighteen months after Apollo XXI, Lacy released The Lo-Fis, a collection of odds and ends stitched together into a 25-minute trip through Lacy’s mind. Its fleshed-out moments reveal a sophisticated approach to songwriting. “Infrunami” is a gorgeously rendered portrait of heartbreak, Lacy’s keen knowledge of how to pace his realisation that he let someone slip away giving the song extra emotional heft; its mournful choirs and pensive strings rise up as the singer rues his lost chance, then drop out, leaving him alone with his thoughts and a glumly strummed chord progression. “4Real” is a jagged funk-rocker with a chaotic chorus, Lacy alternating between flaunting his falsetto and snarling about a “perfect” lover who fits him because “we’re both insane”. The simpler songs also work as ways of showing off Lacy’s appreciation of funk’s building blocks. “Out of Me Head” glides along on an undulating bass line, its simply expressed refrain—“Can't get you out of my head”—serving as its only lyric and illuminating the persistence of romantic memory. "Uuuu" is ecstatic and disbelieving, Lacy’s exclamation “Baby girl, I got you” abetted by sun-dappled guitars. The Lo-Fis captures the moment in Lacy’s career just before “Bad Habit” made him a bona fide pop star, showing how his concept of funk is as malleable as it is rewarding.