unofficial cassette version - The project, which originally debuted on Mother's Day 2014, is a vital release in Mac's catalogue that followed-up his critically-acclaimed sophomore album Watching Movies With The Sound Off. Upon its arrival, the mixtape served as the high water mark for Mac's technical prowess and cemented a creative actualization that would continue through his career; reinventing himself with each new project. Reviewing the project following its release, critic Craig Jenkins succinctly described it as "the best work of his career".
Faces finds Mac Miller embracing the exploratory between-album mixtape. Over an hour and a half, he advances on his last LP's heady sprawl with a palette stretching from rainy day introspection to playful wordplay exercises.
Mac Miller’s most ambitious post-Watching Movies project arrived in the form of a Mother’s Day mixtape called Faces, which advances on his last LP's heady sprawl with a palette stretching from rainy day introspection to playful wordplay exercises. Where Watching Movies was equally concerned with refining his writing skills and presenting a personality you wouldn’t mind sparking up a j with, this mixtape prizes frankness over curation. On cuts like opener “Inside Outside” and “Here We Go”, the latter in which Mac pridefully scans his growing empire and notes that he “did it all without a Drake feature”, the joy is infectious.
