#somethingcosmic

To watch Angel Olsen on her Big Time tour in 2022 was to watch someone who’d settled comfortably into their own both personally and professionally. Despite the title, that album’s steady middle ground between the muddled decadence of All Mirrors and stripped-back Whole New Mess sounded like Angel had finally found some equilibrium. She must’ve been feeling that during the era, too — enough, in fact, to warrant firing back up her own Somethingcosmic imprint. Early December 2024’s Cosmic Waves Volume 1 is the second evidence of said label (her 2021 Aisles EP is the first), though Jagjaguwar’s again doing the heavy lifting on promotion and, it appears, vinyl releases. Regardless, Somethingcosmic gives Olsen “the flexibility to release when and how I want to.” This is money in the bank for the Jagjag camp, so it makes as much cents as it does sense, but what she does with the compilation format here makes for interesting listening.

Photo courtesy of Dana Trippe

After dazzling listeners with her own spellbinding songwriting craft, Angel Olsen is opting for a little fun for her own sake on this week’s release of the Aisles EP, in which she reframes ‘80s pop classics through her own strange gaze. Her take on “Gloria” slowed down the flash dance to a shutter while her interpretation of “The Safety Dance” inserted a synthetic sci-fi soundtrack’s worth of paranoia while feeding off modern day happenings into the narrative. The final preview looks straight into Billy Idol’s 193 new wave ballad “Eyes Without a Face” and paints the stars all over its shadowdy celestial body. Give it a look below...

Photo courtesy of Dana Trippe

Men Without Hats’ 1981 odd-center hit “The Safety Dance” is one of those unusual pop success stories that couldn’t be any more emblematic of its era where the music didn’t need to speak too deeply about anything beyond carefree, emotional joy (especially when paired with an equally whimsical music video) than to just be. In the hands of Angel Olsen and on the fringe of a moment in history defined by our collective concerns over having to think twice about every move in our usual daily lives, it has become something so much more grave in within that mold.

“I felt this song could be reinterpreted to be about the time of quarantine and the fear of being around anyone or having too much fun,” says Olsen of her interpretation of the track, the latest preview off her ‘80s covers EP Aisles. “It made me wonder, is it safe to laugh or dance or be free of it all for just a moment?” The only thing that’s certain here is that Olsen’s futuristic specter traversing its sci-fi synthetic symphony soundscape makes you ponder every intention -- Each verse raising more questions with every move. "Dance" with Angel and your anxieties below...

Photo courtesy of Dana Trippe

If the universe-expanding synths beaming from All Mirrors’ surface and the manifestation of that energy resulting in a maximalist countrypolitan mega ballad alongside kindred spirit Sharon Van Etten hinted at anything, it’s that Angel Olsen’s comfort with polished pop has been growing in recent years, especially when turning to the sound’s ‘80s touchstones. Her next move steps off from there with spontaneity and simply fun intentions, as she’ll be covering five songs from that decade on the Aisles EP, due out at the end of summer digitally and early fall physically on her newly launched Jagjaguwar imprint somethingcosmic.

In Olsen’s own reflection, we’ll hear her take on classics by Billy Idol, Men Without Hats, OMD and Alphaville. Its first preview is of Laura Branigan’s Flashdance smash “Gloria” suggests that of the whole, she will be redirecting each song’s straight-forwardness through her veil of wandering dreams and turn them into something of her own likeness as the listen reverberates through celestial echoes and cellos flow into the ether. “I’d heard ‘Gloria’ for the first time at a family Christmas gathering and was amazed at all the aunts who got up to dance,” reflected Olsen of her creative process. “I imagined them all dancing and laughing in slow motion, and that’s when I got the idea to slow the entire song down and try it out in this way.” She's got its number below...