Elevator Music

I  l o v e  Jeff Buckley. I have been in love with him since I was seven years old and I will never recover. His voice is full of love and pain and longing... and hope too. A simultaneous mix that I have identified with in many moments in my little bright life. What I did not know when I was seven years old was that Jeff loved and loved Nina Simone and that some of the songs I love most are covers of Nina Simone songs. A beautiful beautiful soul she is, with a big heart, and big courage. So, of course I love Nina Simone too:

Don’t try to blow out the sun for me / baby, I am not hoping for what I know can’t be / all that I ask, is for a kiss each day / and I’ll give you love that will never go away / yes, I will / yes, I will

I am pulled so down near the earth and soaring into the thinnest cirrus clouds at once by this devastating love song. It reminds me that even though I want to be so so logical about people and relationships, I am an emotional being who acts on love, is driven by love, and has not stopped dreaming about love since I came to the land of this earth. I want this feeling to be felt for me and to give it.

I love Art Angels. I love it so much. It’s so joyful and sad and angry and powerful and complicated. “Pin” is one of the songs that’s crept up on me and become a standout - the vocal sample/synth that forms the backbone of the song is so maddeningly simple (it’s like… three notes, max) that it’s infectious, and the contrast between the sweet, soft verses and the spiky chorus is delightful. I love the way her impish sense of humor, in the Shakespeare quotes delivered with a sideways grin and the sneering “peace of mind/ must be nice!” that launches the second chorus, gives way to the poignancy of the Fleetwood Mac-quoting bridge. Grimes has a way of building songs that burst wide open right where they should, revealing new information each go-round; her songwriting’s grown in leaps and bounds since Visions, and there’s something new to grab onto each time I listen. What an album.

dejémoslo todo y vamonos para Miami

This song reminds me of home. I remember singing this song with my high school crew en mi carro, jaja.

It’s not everyday that your favorite band re-releases your favorite song from one of your favorite albums. 

Stripped all the way down to the iconic chorus and a few guitar chords, the original demo of “Jude Law and A Semester Abroad” is simply downright devastating. With the amp turned all the way up in this version, it’s hard not to have Lacey’s call and return style vocals ringing and wailing in your head for the rest of the day.

Also, realizing that Lacey recorded this when he was 21 (my age) is a nice reminder that unadulterated angst doesn’t get left behind in your teenage years. 

So, I’ve known about this song for as long as I can remember. Providing the background music for countless love scenes that play in films (...and in my head), the 1959 classic has a title: “Sleepwalk.” I finally sought it out after watching a video of Lana Del Rey’s Endless Summer Tour, where she used it as the intro. 

Fair warning: You may just fall in love with the person next to you while listening to this honeyed melody.

Summer may be over, but it remains as a soft, sweaty, hazy, peaceful memory. Annie’s got her own memories of summer to hold onto, as well - her new single “Cara Mia” is a gentle house-y treat that sounds like a July evening on the beach. Or, more accurately, the reminiscence of a July evening on the beach. Annie has one of the lightest voices in pop music; it can come across as thin in the wrong surroundings, but the gliding synths and sparkling chorus melody here play up the wistfulness. It’s not quite a party song, but instead something you hum to yourself after the party’s over and you’ve watched your crush leave, pondering what you might’ve said - and what you might say the next time you have a chance.

I’ve been trying to figure out what it is about Every Open Eye that’s not quite clicking with me, and I think I’ve got it - it’s actually what my memory warped The Bones of What You Believe into being, which is too eager to please. Bones tempered its sugariness with a violent bite and a sense of the sinister that’s sorely missing here. This time out, Chvrches’ approach feels really influenced by touring, since all the songs seem built to really blast off live; when the strategy works, it works incredibly well, but with everything aiming for maximum wallop, there’s no room to fail. If a chorus melody, a central lyric, a single synth riff doesn’t fall exactly into place like a Tetris block, you’re sunk, stuck with stadium-sized sound without stadium-sized feeling to match. “Clearest Blue,” with a climax so spectacularly effective it’s easy to forget that it’s literally two notes, is an example of them pulling it off; the over-saccharine “Make Them Gold” and a lot of the album’s forgettable mid/back section misses the mark. 

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to give your audiences something to dance to, but too much of Every Open Eye feels hesitant to really commit, with weaker melodies and lyrics lacking the first album’s punch. Bones’ biggest single had the delightfully gruesome image of “putting your head in my hands/ it’s a souvenir,” like Salome fronting an electropop outfit; nothing here even touches that kind of specificity. Lyrics were never Chvrches’ strongest suit, but on their best songs they hid messy feelings inside clean, candy-sweet sounds, a contrast that played up the cold clarity in Lauren Mayberry’s voice and gave their music a sense of depth and longevity. Every Open Eye isn’t a bad album per se, but there’s a sense of oversimplification that keeps it from reaching the heights of their debut.

Yet, like Bones’ majestic “You Caught the Light,” it ends on one of its strongest moments, one that suggests another direction they could take: “Afterglow” is gorgeous and heartbreaking, Mayberry singing softly about picking up the pieces over a glowing synth organ that expands and expands and expands until… silence. Then, a whopper of a closing line: “I’ve given up all I can.” After the upbeat precision that comes before, that stark admission of defeat suddenly opens a window onto the human hearts behind it. That kind of clear honesty is a good look for Chvrches, and what I hope drives their next effort.

I’ve been a fan of Potty Mouth since I saw them opening for Joanna Gruesome and Perfect Pussy last year (which, by the way: that’s one hell of a bill). "Cherry Picking”, which leads off their delightful new self-titled EP, takes their scrappy throwback appeal and runs with it. Abby Weems’ sneer has gotten more pronounced, the hooks more insistent, the production cleaner and more anthemic. There’s a specific kind of feeling associated with being young and figuring your shit out - you gravitate towards your influences not just because you like them, but because they help you figure out who you’re going to be. "Cherry Picking” celebrates the process of becoming, wrapped up in 3 minutes of perfect air-guitar punk.

The last month was kind of bereft of new music for me until, suddenly, it wasn’t. Thank god for Georgia. Her self-titled album is thick, dirty, and has a percussive kick that feels vital as summer fades into fall. I love the fake-out that opens “Move Systems”, the lead single - the tinny synth giving way to a drum track that sounds like subway rattling crossed with a machine gun. What’s amazing too is that, despite all the activity in the song (the drums, the pinging synths, the fat distorted bass, and the huge central hook), she still communicates space and iciness rather than letting it sound too crowded. It’s a song about resistance that sounds like controlled chaos, achieving a kind of invincibility - the world is fucked up but goddamn, are we powerful or what?

E•MO•TION is an album made of perfect touches - the way Carly’s melodies swoop around, never quite settling; the million little production flourishes (the sax in “Run Away With Me” or the slap bass in “All That”) that add detail and texture to her streamlined synthpop; lyrics that aren’t afraid to sacrifice easy platitude-ism for something more awkward, anxious, and dark. Here, that perfect touch is provided by a bone-simple drum track, mixed perfectly in and countering the Robyn-esque 80′s storm of the production, that powers the song forward as Carly launches herself to greater and greater heights of anguish. That, and “I love you!/ I’m sorry!/ I’m sorry!/ I love you!”, desperation and desire mingling together to the point of explosion. Carly’s greatest trick is making impossible alchemy look easy: this is utterly flawless pop.

Been on a teenpop kick recently, so Liz’s vocal resemblance here to Britney Spears was what first grabbed me. Second was the blown-out bass in the chorus - sugar cut with blood. As the summer heats up, this is how I wish all pop music sounded: sweet, aggressive, and impossible not to imagine playing on car speakers.

The brokenhearted bad girl trope is kind of underutilized in pop music to these ears. Perhaps because it’s easier to sympathize with a protagonist who’s been definitely wronged, or relationships whose dissolution leaves no room for self-doubt or self-blame, only righteous anger. But there’s been kind of a mini-wave of songs from talented songwriters exploring this emotional space recently - Tinashe’s “All Hands On Deck” comes to mind, along with the more downtrodden tracks on Charli XCX’s Sucker. Add to that little collection this new track from LA “dark pop,” queer girl-band MUNA.

Though it’s a little clumsy at moments - the “went down on you at the gallery” lyric, in particular, feels somewhat forced - it so gracefully explores the weird headspace where hedonism and heartbreak mix that it’s hard to resist. Part of that is down to Katie Gavin’s vocal performance, which manages to move from simmering resentment to wistful regret and back, often within a single line; her delivery of “I’m surprised/ you don’t wanna stay by my side” is devastating in all the best ways. And set to a breezy, nocturnal, 80s-inflected arrangement and one of the best chorus melodies I’ve heard in months, “So Special” becomes something pretty, er, special.

Stereogum is streaming Vanbot’s killer sophomore album Perfect Storm. I really liked her self-titled debut, but this is... something else entirely. It’s like the Scandi-pop equivalent of H.R. Giger’s strange, organic-yet-unnatural artwork for the Alien films; this is music that breathes with a sinister energy, dark yet danceable, and utterly distinct. Against all that comes Ester Ideskog, sounding totally in control, emotional but riding the, er, storm with confidence and brio. She’s spoken about how, after releasing previous singles “Hold This Moment” and “When My Heart Breaks,” she felt burned out and uninspired and had to go back to the drawing board before returning; it delayed the album by a year and could have sapped the project of all its momentum. Instead, Perfect Storm is the sound of a songwriter no longer afraid of her own voice. It’s stunning.

Best tracks: “Watching You Sleep (feat. Adam Olenius),” “Maniac,” “Better in the Light”

It’s been awhile. How have you been?

I’ve been up and down, but there’s a lot of music to share, so I’ll start here. Allie X. Pop songstress from Toronto, now based in LA. She just released her debut EP, Collxtion I, and it’s incredible. She telegraphs darkness by turning up the pop artifice as far as it can possibly go - her voice, clear and bright, careens over hooks so genius that they become insidious, backed by twinkling 80s synths cut with cavernous reverb. “I could love you for the rest of my life” never sounded quite so spooky.

Review // Tkay Maidza, Switch Tape

The best moment on the rising Australian rapper Tkay Maidza's debut mixtape, Switch Tape, is a short few seconds towards the end - she flips the instantly recognizable "uh-huh, honey" sample from Kanye West's "Bound 2" just before her breakout single, "U-Huh," blasts off. That may sound like an insult; after all, if the highlight of your tape is someone else's production, used as an introduction to a song we've already heard, what does that say about the quality of the rest of your work? But actually, that sample is amazing because of how well it encompasses Switch Tape: this is one of the most euphoric 30 minutes of music I've heard in ages, gleefully ping-ponging between genres and samples, tied together by Maidza's rapid-fire flows and sweet, agile singing.

The easiest and closest reference point might be M.I.A, who similarly creates patchwork beats from disparate elements; there's also a little bit of Azealia Banks in Maidza's kinetic energy and sense of city-kid sophistication. But this mixtape is more dance-focused than either of those artists, with production that spans from house grooves to dubstep-flirting drops; it sounds like the coolest house party you were lucky enough to be invited to, hosted by the coolest girl you were lucky enough to befriend. Maidza projects confidence and youthful energy without sounding immature - rather, she just sounds like she's having the time of her life, matching the irrepressible bounce of the music.

It's hard to pick individual highlights, not just because the tape is sequenced as one long track, but also because the quality is so high across the board. The pounding Bok Bok-produced "Finish Them" is a definite stunner, though, her irresistible hooks ("underground queen in the zone/it's me!") incorporated into the beat as rhythmic elements while she runs circles around the track with an audible grin on the verses. Must Die!'s future floor-filler "Imprint" also stands out, with Maidza delivering the chorus with such fervor that it sounds like a prophecy: "I'm gonna make an imprint!"

And then, of course, there's the Elk-produced "U-Huh," which still sounds as vital as it did the first time I heard it. That brings us back to its introductory sample - the way it interfaces with a pop-culture touchstone and recontextualizes it to fit Maidza's party brought a massive smile to my face. It demonstrates just how devoted Switch Tape is to pushing the listener's pleasure center, and just how good it is at doing so. Tkay Maidza has put together one of the most exciting debuts of the year, and I can't wait to see where it takes her.