Don’t tell Danny Brown he can rap over anything. Even if it’s true—the Detroit rapper has paired his dexterous rhymes and his stretchy, versatile voice on prog rock, EDM, boom-bap, and seemingly everything in between—he’s weary of people making more of his expansive tastes than they are. “I don’t want it to be a gimmick,” he tells Apple Music. “Is the music enjoyable or not?” From that perspective, it makes perfect sense that Brown chose to build his new album, Stardust, in the sounds of the hyperpop scene. Not only is it a natural progression sonically from previous albums like XXX, Atrocity Exhibition, and his SCARING THE HOES collaboration with JPEGMAFIA; it’s also the perfect soundtrack for this stage of his life. Brown’s previous solo album, 2023’s Quaranta, was largely somber and reflective: While its title was designed to commemorate him turning 40, the lyrics found him picking up the shattered pieces of his life after years of substance abuse, a messy breakup due to infidelity, and music feeling more like a job than a tool of creative expression. But on Stardust, he’s confident, excited, and having the time of his life. “Sleeping real good at night, ’cause I’m proud of myself,” he raps on album opener “Book of Daniel.” “Say a prayer when I wake up because that rehab helped.” He says that his drug-addled party raps in the 2010s and early 2020s were initially just a result of trying to rap about something different from the dope-dealing bars that populated his earlier work. “I don’t ever think I heard the word Adderall in a rap before I said it, and now it’s just normal,” he says. “But I’m not proud of that at all. ’Oh, I created drug culture in rap.’ That’s not how I want to be remembered. That’s why I’m off that shit.” A collection of beats and choruses by hyperpop heavy hitters like Quadeca, Holly, and underscores are bright, eccentric, dance-ready, and skittery. But Brown insists that upbeat instrumentals don’t mean the raps lack substance. “If the beats are going to be more poppy than normal, I gotta talk about something. I can’t let it be dumbed down,” he says. “I knew I wanted to say something, but I didn’t just want to repeat myself, And I didn’t want it to be the ‘I’m sober’ album. To me, that’s no different than me making a druggie album again.” These aren’t just mindless pop tunes, even if they go down easy. “Lift You Up” is a dance-ready number with Angel Prost (her Frost Children sister Lulu Prost also shows up on the album) about a toxic relationship, while “Flowers” features a chorus by vocalist 8485 and joyful, triumphant raps about how Brown has persevered through hard times. “Starburst” has Brown landing boastful punchline raps over a discordant, screeching beat, and “1999” pairs more confident bars with skittery synths and metal-heavy shrieks by JOHNNASCUS. “The End” is the most powerful of all, though: a nearly nine-minute journey in three parts, with Danny vulnerably revisiting his years of addiction with candor, clarity, and accountability before making a promise to himself to never go back. The ethereal drum ’n’ bass sound bed and dreamy vocals by Zheani make the song sound like the closing credits on a samurai video game from the 2000s. It’s a fitting conclusion for someone who’s crystal clear about his priorities for the first time in way too long. “50 Cent told me,” Brown says, “that if I just wanted to make music for myself, I might as well just stay in my basement.”