Nazar Demilitarize
Nazar's Demilitarize reframes kuduro as a vulnerable, sci-fi-tinged inquiry into illness, memory and recovery, and across five professional reviews critics largely agree it succeeds. Earning a 79/100 consensus score from five reviews, the record privileges intimate textures and fractured rhythms that translate bodily and psychic trauma into peculiar, moving club music. The question of whether Demilitarize is good finds its answer in repeated praise for songs that foreground voice and atmosphere over pure dancefloor attack.
Reviewers consistently point to standout tracks as the album's emotional center: “Anticipate”, “DMZ” and “Mantra” recur as highlights, while “Heal” and “Disarm” are noted for compressing illness and recovery into riveting minutes. Critics from Pitchfork, Resident Advisor and The Quietus emphasize Nazar's meticulous sound design - woozy kuduro, organ-led R&B touches and lo-fi, Burial-adjacent spaces - that let fragile vocals carry themes of identity, control and trauma. Several reviews frame the record as a deconstruction of kuduro that favors liminal, club-adjacent soundscapes and introspective storytelling.
Not all commentary is uncritical: while most reviewers admire the album's emotional clarity and production craft, some underline that its rewards require close listening rather than immediate, floor-ready hooks. Even so, the professional reviews coalesce around the idea that Demilitarize is a distinctive, humane statement in Nazar's catalog, one where the best songs - especially “Anticipate”, “DMZ” and “Mantra” - emerge as essential touchpoints for anyone seeking the best songs on Demilitarize or wondering what critics say about the record. Below, the full reviews unpack how these tracks balance club tension, vulnerability and sonic invention.
Critics' Top Tracks
The standout songs that made critics take notice
Heal
3 mentions
"compresses a mental-health episode into five riveting minutes"— Pitchfork
Anticipate
5 mentions
"He sounds like a warbly James Blake on opener "Anticipate," wheezy and almost off-putting"— Pitchfork
DMZ
5 mentions
"brighten into glowing whorls around Nazar's sure-footed and catchy chorus on the final track, "DMZ""— Resident Advisor
compresses a mental-health episode into five riveting minutes
Track Ratings
How critics rated each track, relative to this album (0-100). Only tracks that made critics feel something are rated.
Core
Anticipate
War Game
Mantra
Unlearn
Disarm
Open
Safe
Heal
DMZ
What Critics Are Saying
Deep insights from 5 critics who reviewed this album
Critic's Take
Nazar's Demilitarize finds its best moments in intimate, destabilizing songs like “Mantra” and “Heal”, where his voice and fragile rhythms do most of the communicating. The record makes the case for the best tracks on Demilitarize being those that translate bodily and psychic illness into vivid, woozy kuduro - “Mantra” for its muttered directive, “Heal” for compressing a mental-health episode into riveting minutes. The opener “Anticipate” and the organ-led “Core” also stand out, offering uneasy beauty and steadying R&B lilt amid jagged percussion. Overall the album’s best songs are the ones that marry raw production and Nazar’s intimate presence to transform trauma into strange, enthralling music.
Key Points
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The best song, "Heal", is best because it compresses a mental-health episode into five riveting minutes with smudged, haunting production.
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The album’s strength is its intimate focus on Nazar’s voice and raw production, transforming personal and familial trauma into woozy, destabilizing kuduro.
Themes
Re
Critic's Take
Nazar's Demilitarize finds its clearest triumphs in tracks like “Anticipate” and “DMZ”, where crushed kuduro and hazy vocals become unexpectedly affecting. Joseph Francis writes with measured awe as the record reduces boisterous rhythm into the brittle, shimmering fragments heard on “Anticipate” and then resolves into the catchy, glowing chorus of “DMZ”. The review privileges the album's intimate voice and wounded tenderness, noting how songs such as “Open” and “Unlearn” reveal vulnerability that lifts the record beyond mere stylistic experiment. This is a personal, ambient-kuduro record that rewards close listening with a handful of standout tracks that double as the album's emotional center.
Key Points
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The best song is "Anticipate" because it transforms kuduro's boisterous rhythm into brittle, ambient fragments that foreground vulnerability.
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The album's core strengths are its unique deconstruction of kuduro rhythms and intimate vocal framing that trace a journey toward healing.
Themes
Critic's Take
Nazar's Demilitarize is a record that turns inward, where the best tracks - notably “Anticipate” and “DMZ” - render destabilisation as gorgeous, uneasy music. The reviewer's voice lingers on intimate textures and wonky tenderness, describing “Disarm” and “Mantra” as squirming caresses and seasick beauties that make the album's faint heart beat. There is praise for Nazar's sound-design craft, the way songs like “Safe” nestle amid criss-crossing signals while vocals wobble with taut warble. Ultimately the critic frames the closer “DMZ” as the standout, a sustained swoon that leaves the most indelible mark, summing up why listeners seek the best tracks on Demilitarize.
Key Points
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The closer “DMZ” is the standout, praised as a sustained, indelible swoon.
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The album's strengths are its intimate sound design, textural detail, and the melding of love, illness, and identity.
Themes
Critic's Take
Nazar's Demilitarize cements him as a producer who can write sci-fi dancefloor fillers that feel painfully human, with tracks like “DMZ” and “Disarm” standing out for their cinematic weight and club-ready tension. Rhys Delany writes with measured enthusiasm, noting that Nazar's lo-fi, Burial-adjacent soundscape and his new, effect-layered vocals make songs such as “DMZ” feel both precient and personal. The record balances subdued, cinematic moments and dancefloor urgency, which is why listeners asking for the best tracks on Demilitarize will find “DMZ” and “Disarm” repeatedly rewarded. Delany's tone is admiring but precise, framing the album as a rare human-centred electronic statement rather than mere genre exercise.
Key Points
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The best song(s) like "DMZ" are best because they marry cinematic, dystopian textures with dancefloor tension and human-focused songwriting.
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The album's core strengths are its sci-fi-informed production, personal Angolan inflections, and successful integration of vocal storytelling into lo-fi electronic soundscapes.
Themes
Critic's Take
On Nazar's Demilitarize the best songs reveal his retreat from battlelines into fragile introspection. The bruised plea of “Anticipate” — where "Freedom comes at a cost" surfaces through phasing vocals — and the club-scarred propulsion of “War Game” stand out as the album's most affecting moments, while closing track “DMZ” frames that fragile armistice. Tracks like “Mantra” and “Safe” offer quiet tenderness that points toward hope, making them essential listening for anyone searching for the best tracks on Demilitarize.
Key Points
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Anticipate is best for its phased, vulnerable vocal delivery and the lyric "Freedom comes at a cost" crystallizing the album's emotional core.
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The album's core strengths are its blend of club-derived soundscapes with candid vulnerability and themes of trauma and gradual recovery.