Isaiah Falls is seeing years of work pay off in real time. His audience has grown considerably since “Florida Baby” helped bring more listeners into his world, and the success has given him room to revisit music he made long before many fans knew his name. Instead of leaving those songs behind, Falls is bringing some of them into the current chapter of his career, trusting what still feels right after all this time.

His rise accelerated with 2024’s Drugs n’ Lullabies, and now, Falls has amassed more than 300 million global streams and worked with artists including SiR and Alex Isley. More recently, he joined YG, Odeal and Sasha Keable on “Simon Says,” while his single “TABOO” has generated more than 12 million streams.

Still, the Orlando-born artist has been thinking about LVRS PARADISE for much longer than his recent success suggests. The project began taking form years ago before being put aside as his career took another direction. After releasing SIDE A, he will complete the album with LVRS PARADISE: SIDE B on July 31, giving listeners songs pulled from several different periods of his creative life.

Some have survived because Falls still feels the same spark when he revisits them. “For songs to be five years old and to still feel new is a testament to how good the music really is,” he says.

With another tour ahead and a growing audience following his work, Falls is entering the next phase of his career. Ahead of SIDE B’s release, ESSENCE spoke with the singer about the album, the success of his new record and where he wants to take his live show next.

ESSENCE: You’ve got a tour coming up in September—how are you feeling about that?

Isaiah Falls: Man, I’m looking forward to it. For me, it’s always fun to be able to go see my fans and really be able to touch them, talk to them, hug them, cry with them, all that stuff. I know last year was an incredible tour and I was kind of wilding out. I was in the crowd jumping around. I was doing the most last year. This year is going to be a little more elegant. It’s going to be nice. So I’m excited to put on a show with y’all. And I got my boys Luxury Lane headlining with me. They’re my main band. They’re also my main producers. The executive produced the album and they’re going to be on the stage with me playing the music. 

I’m super excited to have them with me. And I get a chance to bring one of my homies on tour with me too. RAAHiiM. He’s going to be opening for me. And Icee Red is going to be opening for me as well. My main DJ, he’s going to have his own set, so a much longer set than he did normally the years prior. It’s going to be a good time. This tour is going to be beautiful. And as long as hell, it’s like two months. 

What prompted the change? You said you wanted this tour to be more “elegant.”

IF: I think this is going to be the tour right before we get to where I want to be. This tour’s going to be elegant because I eventually want people sitting down. I want people to be comfortable. I want to do more amphitheaters. The bar is going to be set a little higher for the next tour. Last year I was in the crowd wilding out. This year we’re growing up a little bit. 

July 31st, LVRS Paradise (Side B) will be out. Talk to me about that album, your excitement about it, and why you decided to split the album up into two parts.

IF: Absolutely. The main reason for the split was I just make a lot of music. For me personally, I had this album in the works for over five years. So some of the songs on Side B are five years old, some are three years old, some are whatever. It’s been a time. LVRS Paradise was my first album I was going to drop. And I caught with “Florida Baby” and a couple songs after that, and I was like, “okay, this is what the fans want for me. Let me dive into this style of music.” So, I put LVRS Paradise on pause, and now we get to finally resume. So when I got Drugs n’ Lullabies out the way and I started working back on LVRS Paradise, I was like, damn, I got five years of music right here. 

So, let’s split it up. Disc one, disc two, and that way we can spread out the album and I can give people my favorite songs from the last five years I’ve been creating. And that was the main reason for splitting it up. I’m very excited for people to hear this because for songs to be five years old, they kind of have to stand the test of time, because sound changes over time. So for songs to be that old and to still feel new is the testament to how good the music is. I’ve been at it for years, so being able to come full circle with this album feels good. 

Adding to that; how do you think that you’ve grown as an artist since the release of Side A to now?

IF: I think the understanding of who I am has definitely been more defined. I think the understanding of what my fans want for me and then what I want for myself. So on Side B, I made it a priority to make sure I give the fans what they really want for me. Because I could do anything under the sun when it comes to music. I could do any genre, any style, any flow. But to be able to express myself how I want to, I want to give the fans that super sexy R&B shit they love from me, and then the shit I want to do, may be a little more left than a typical R&B song. 

How have you been feeling about the response of “Taboo?”

IF: It’s going crazy. To me, it having 15,000 videos made to it on social media from different fans to the song having over 12 million streams already, and it’s only been a couple of months. It’s doing good. As soon as you press play on that song, you know it’s a hit. And when I got that beat initially, it was that. I was like, “Oh yeah, this is a hit—this is going to be the single.” And I didn’t even write the song yet, and I knew it. I knew it. So I’m glad the fans feel the same way I felt when I first heard that. 

The video is really dope as well. Talk to me about how the video came together, and how much involvement did you have in the creative process?

IF: I’m a big part of my creative process. I came with the idea of the “Taboo” video six years ago, but I didn’t have the budget to do it. I wanted to do some Belly shit. I want to walk through a club with beautiful women around—I wanted to push the boundaries. I want to walk through what you would consider a brothel, something super sexy. So, I had that idea forever ago, but we finally got the bread now. Shout out to Edgar Daniel for helping me execute. He’s incredible.

You spoke about having songs for five, six years. How do you know what songs to keep and what to put out?

IF: A lot of the time for me, it’s if it still gives me that feeling when I first heard a lot of my favorite music, you know what I mean? When I first heard good kid, m.A.A.d city or “November 18th” or My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, I had this feeling. I’m like, “oh, this is crazy.” And when you actually take a step back from your music that you made five years ago and you come back to it and it still gives you that feeling, then you’re on the right path with that one. That’s typically what I search for.

You work with a whole bunch of artists—Alex Isley, Joyce Wrice, SiR—the list goes one. Is there a specific collaboration that taught you something new about yourself as an artist?

IF: 100%. It had to be my session with SiR. I think a lot of what I learned from that session is that a lot of time artists don’t know necessarily if they’re on the right path. And when I was working with SiR, he told me “you’re on the right path, you’re doing it right,” It was just the stamp I needed at that time, which kind of just helped guide me to where I am now. It was just a good co-sign for sure.

Do you create new music while you’re on tour, or do you have to lock in for performance mode?

IF: The beauty of my going on tour is that I’m with my main producers. If they get inspired, I can’t help but get inspired too. And if I get inspired, they’re going to jump in and they’re going to do what they got to do. So it’s like on the road, we may not do it every night like some artists, but we definitely find pockets to still create. One of the songs on this album—“Play Ya Cards, ”featuring 03 Greedo—was made on the road last year. It’s actually a three-year-old song that we repurposed. We remade the beat while we were on tour last year.

As an R&B artist, as a man, what does the word “love” mean to you?

IF: For me personally, it’s the willingness to show up over and over again. I think love, there’s good times, there’s bad times. And through the bad times, as long as you’re showing up and still trying your best, I think that’s where the beauty and the real beauty in the word “love” is.

Read the original article on Essence.