For much of the past few years, contemporary Kenyan R&B was the go-to calling card of artists who liked to colour within the lines, of familiar songwriting perspectives, sounds, and vocal styles shaped by a few dominant creators. The result was music that felt instantly identifiable and leaned toward soul with a slight Afrobeats influence. The decline in popularity and performance of stalwarts like Sanaipei Tande, Otile Brown and even Wyre also coincided with the scene’s embrace of, or forced marriage to, each and every brand of South African house music. This was the prevailing pattern across Africa. The Amapiano explosion caused an elevation of safe and bankable acts above their predefined genres, having them exist as style benders who could contort themselves to fit any sound, while RnB was placed on the back burner. For those who needed that RnB itch scratched, that longing was met, if only in part, by a cohort of alternative artists whose work carried an unmistakable reverence for jazz, New Jack Swing, and classic neo-soul.
Lately, a faint light has begun to gather at the end of the tunnel, made brighter still by the unlikely but quietly assured partnership between producer Ukweli and singer-songwriter Xenia Manasseh. On 7 November, they released the 6-track Maybe II EP, delivering a concise collection that shows how naturally their partnership continues to evolve. Maybe II is the follow up to their 2022 EP Maybe. On this sequel, the duo continue to demonstrate the strength in their collaboration by creating a project defined not by formula or predictability, but by consistent quality and a sense of intimacy. Xenia Manasseh, the Nairobi-born singer who has become one of R&B’s most recognizable voices, is intent on reminding listeners that the tour de force she debuted as is still very much alive, now carrying a deeper, more lived-in glow. After cementing her staying power with two full length LPs in 2023 and 2024, she does the fusion dance with Ukweli to provide us with a project whose brevity is its biggest weakness. When the EP comes to a close, it lands almost as a surprise, the 18 minutes slip by before you’ve had time to register them.
Xenia isn’t a callback to earlier artists, who, for a moment, reshaped what contemporary Kenyan R&B and Afro-Soul could sound like. In fact, the unique thing that makes Xenia’s music so magnetic is its refusal to be pinned down, and just how deep and diverse her repertoire seems to be. After her scene-stealing verse on Watendawili’s Beba, she jumps back into her Swahili bag here with Rudia, Maybe II‘s lead single. Employing a mix of Swahili and English, Xenia floats all over the Afro-beat and RnB fusion beat masterfully crafted by Ukweli, culminating in one of the most ethereal and sultry hooks that I have heard in a long time. “Ukikiri hisia, nitatenda/na ukisema unapenda nitarudia”. Rudia is filled to the brim with a sensual defiance, and it is this newfound confidence that gives the writing on the project’s songs an edgy resonance that hadn’t quite surfaced on Xenia’s previous works. Likewise, the sweet, lifting soprano at the heart of “Bittersweet” yields to a self-awareness that is evident across all the six tracks in the EP. “If I linger in the corner of my mind / I’ll find you / So if you know better / You should do better,” she sings, offering a candidness that defines much of her writing. It gestures toward a broader coming-of-age arc, one we sense in pieces rather than in full.
Rudia and Bittersweet highlight the most appealing thing about this project. Maybe II picks up right where its 2022 predecessor left off, utilising Ukweli’s signature approach, layering a minimalist landscape of drum loops, warm chords, and ethereal keys as a blank canvas for Xenia’s forthright, introspective lyricism, which she approaches with the dedication of a renaissance painter. What makes this partnership so compelling is the way they lift the everyday textures of modern romance, desire, uncertainty, and finally self-love into melodies that settle in quietly, only to surprise you later by how deeply they’ve stayed. I have found myself subconsciously humming the melody to Rudia ever since I heard it the first time.
The project’s appeal is starkly obvious from the jump. “Options,” the EP’s opening track, drops the listener straight into the central tension. Built on a taut mid-tempo groove and a portrait of an unstable lover, it’s a study in emotional volatility. Xe’s delicate, yet commanding voice cuts through the emotional fog. If anything qualifies as situationship music, this does. “Options” feels like the spiritual successor to “Love Me Or Leave Me”, the stand out track from 2022’s Maybe.
Maybe II doesn’t chase production trends; it deepens a niche that the duo had already established. Ukweli maintains a tonal singularity even when he experiments. On Rudia, he injects a bouncy, crisp percussive pattern that gives the track a shining, almost danceable quality without losing the project’s core emotional charge. “EAST2HWOOD” emerges as the project’s clearest stylistic shift, shaped by a soft, atmospheric blend of ’80s R&B and neo-soul to create a mood-forward sensibility that leans into Xenia’s soulful characteristic. Crucially, the experiment doesn’t unsettle the collaboration. Ukweli remains grounded in his own sensibilities, crafting a framework that allows both his production and Xenia’s performance to function at their strongest.
The project is so cohesive and deliberate that any track which might feel “not up to scratch” is less about quality and more about whether it momentarily sacrifices emotional depth for sonic experimentation. The highs on this project are striking, providing further evidence that Xenia Manasseh and Ukweli can craft a fully realized musical statement in less than twenty minutes (I really hope Maybe III is a full length album). Maybe II is the sound of artists who have discovered a chemistry that’s unmistakably theirs and, thankfully, aren’t afraid to perfect it. What a breath of fresh air, revisited.
