Super Bloom

Darryl Lenox’s second album is built on the premise that a complete loss of eyesight is actually a pretty good way to avoid the visual garbage of the modern world. Waking up entirely blind in 2021 after years of deteriorating vision, Lenox uses his new reality to find a philosophical perspective on contemporary society. He works clean of the visual panic of the pandemic and racial tension, arguing that not seeing the news makes him a far more objective observer.

Released on Stand Up! Records, the album serves as a thematic sequel to his 2012 breakout, Blind Ambition. Lenox mixes heavy personal tragedies, including his blindness, a divorce, and the loss of his ex-wife to suicide, with an easygoing optimism that matches his daily mantra of health, wealth, success, and love. Notable tracks like “Blindness > Blackness” find him explaining why losing his sight took the fear out of being a Black man in America. He also tells stories about friendly Newfoundlanders reclaiming racial slurs and the logistics of a half-hearted back rub. The record went to number one on the iTunes comedy chart and was praised for finding a silver lining in a decade’s worth of bad luck.