NIKI Is Having the Time of Her Life in "Vintage"

I know that one day soon NIKI is going to be huge. This Indonesian-born, US-based R&B singer first grabbed our attention with pitch-perfect gems like "I Like U," and "See U Never"—two songs that sounded like long-lost classics from the late '90s. And when I saw her post those dreamy, neon bedroom pictures on her Instagram, I was really hoping that her debut album was going to drop this week.

Turns out, we're going to have to wait a little longer. "Vintage," talks about a kind of lover all of us will have at one point in life. This is the ex we still think about tenderly from time-to-time—the one our mind always come back to, even though we know it will never work out. Sometimes, "vintage" just means over-worn. And sometimes it means the most-relatable pop song out right now.

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Seriously, can someone give me NIKI's birth chart? Because she is reading my heart, and while I know she's an Aquarius, I bet there's a Pisces on her chart somewhere too.

So, back to this song. It sort of made me sad, not because I was thinking about lost loves of my own, but because I really, and I mean really, wanted to like it more than I did. Her earlier singles were the kinds of laid-back hits that usually only live deep in the YouTube hole or on some dusty cassette tape. This new stuff sounds a bit too "pop poppity pop," to me—it's too new, and too much like something Ariana Grande would release.

The best part of the song was, to me, the “Oh” sound because it reminded me of one of the greatest songs of all time, "Dilemma," by Nelly and Kelly Rowland. While I was pretty disappointed, I'm still probably going to bump "Vintage," in the car on the way to work, but I'm also still waiting for NIKI to release that breakout hit. Thankfully, I won't have to wait too long—NIKI's debut EP is due to drop on 23 May. Only a few more weeks…