On Jan. 17, 2020, “Circles”, the album by late famous lyrical artist Mac Miller, whose real name is Malcolm McCormick, was released with the help of fellow artist Jon Brion, along with the McCormick family. The album consists of 12 songs: “Circles,” “Complicated,” “Blue World,” “Good News,” “I Can See,” “Everybody,” “Woods,” “Hand Me Downs,” “That’s On Me,” “Hands,” “Surf” and “Once A Day.”

Miller passed away from an accidental drug overdose on Sept. 7, 2018, and his most recent album is meant to be a follow-up to his previous album titled, “Swimming.” “Swimming” details the struggles Miller had in his life and how he learned to move past them in order to better himself as an individual. While writing these two albums, he showed a strong psychological growth along with healing throughout the process. The two albums together convey the phrase, “Swimming in Circles.”

I would personally say that “Circles” is at the top of my list of favorite albums of all time. Miller started out as a full-blown rapper, and over the years he transformed into more of a singer, which really allowed listeners to feel the weight of his words. The song that I feel the most connection to is, “Good News”; in particular the section where he sings, “Well, it ain’t that bad, it could always be worse.” I believe that that verse is very relatable for a lot of students who are wrestling with mental health, just like Miller, because society tends to shrink individuals’ struggles with their own minds, which leads them to belittling their own mental health by saying, “It could always be worse.”

On Jan. 8, 2020, Miller’s family posted to his Instagram account the following announcement: “Here we are. The act of having to write this at all feels surreal. At the time of his passing, Malcolm was well into the process of recording his companion album to ‘Swimming,’ entitled ‘Circles.’ Two different styles complementing each other, completing a circle — ‘Swimming in Circles’ was the concept. He had been working with Jon Brion, who after hearing some early versions of songs, cleared his calendar to help Malcolm fine-tune them. After his passing, Jon dedicated himself to finishing ‘Circles’ based on his time and conversations with Malcolm. We are eternally grateful to Jon and to those who gave their best to the difficult and emotional task of putting out this body of work.

This is a complicated process that has no right answer. No clear path. We simply know that it was important to Malcolm for the world to hear it. One of the most difficult decisions in the process is how best to let people know about it — how to communicate meaningfully to let people know about it — how to communicate meaningfully while keeping sacred what should be kept sacred. So this will be the only post on any of his channels. Information regarding this release, his charity and Malcolm himself will be found at @92tilinfinity. Thank you to all the fans who’ve supported him unconditionally through the years. We miss him. We are left to imagine where Malcolm was going and to appreciate where he was. We hope you take the time to listen. The look on his face when everyone was listening said it all.

With humility and gratitude. Malcolm’s family.”