Fluxblog Weekly #94: Syd, Letherette, Rose Elinor Dougall, Hanni El Khatib, Sandscape
February 6th, 2017
The Life That I Choose
Syd “Shake Em Off”
“Shake ‘Em Off” reminds me a lot of Missy Elliott and Timbaland’s mid-‘90s material, at least in that it’s got this very similar push-and-pull between lushness and minimalism; warm sensuality and aloof distance; clever artsiness and pop hooks. Syd’s voice is very much at home in a track like this – there’s always a lot of shades of ambiguity in her phrasing, so Hit-Boy’s production makes that an asset rather than a liability. It is interesting that Syd’s singing about being sure of her decisions and confident that she’s about to become a star, but the overall tone of the music is quite ambivalent. I don’t think she’s undermining her self-belief, but I do think adding these shades of uncertainty feels emotionally true.
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Letherette “Villim”
“Villim” sounds like it should be soundtracking a sequence in a movie that’s dark and frightening, but also a bit surreal. A late night journey, an encounter with something alien, lost in a forest. Something like that. The string parts – sampled, I’m guessing, but I have no idea – are overtly cinematic, but the magic in this is the way they’ve chopped up these chiming sounds so it sounds quite lovely, but clipped up just enough to feel slightly unstable.
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February 7th, 2017
The Fear Of Closing Time
Rose Elinor Dougall “Closer”
Rose Elinor Dougall’s voice has always signaled a thoughtful introversion, even back when she was one of the Pipettes. Back then it subverted the band’s retro girl group aesthetic – she came off like the sort of ostensibly shy girl who’s always about to say something a bit cutting and wry when people aren’t looking. Her solo work has been a lot more mellow and demure, so it’s interesting to hear her move in a slightly more danceable direction with her new record. “Closer” is still fairly reserved as far as dance rock tunes go, but there’s enough of a groove and hook to it that the music nudges her to be a little bolder. But only so much – this is a song about passively waiting for someone to make a move, and she sounds a lot more impatient than insistent.
Buy it from Amazon.
February 8th, 2017
The Screams Will Be Real
Hanni El Khatib “Gonna Die Alone”
I feel like the phrase “die alone” is most commonly associated with being a frustrated single person, but this song by Hanni El Khatib goes to a darker place than that. This is more about paranoia, and feeling like everyone is out to get you one way or another, and just wondering when it’s all going to finally end. There’s a bit of humor in this – you can tell he’s smirking in some lines, and the tone of the music is fairly loose and fun. But despite that, the core of this really is anxiety and terror, and this powerful feeling that you have no control over your destiny, and that no one is willing to help you. It’s an incredibly fatalistic tune, but pretty funky too.
Buy it from Amazon.
February 10th, 2017
Keep It Sugar Coated
Sandscape “Artifical Rush”
“Artificial Rush” is the sort of song that sounds as if it can only exist at night, and that it’s deeply inappropriate to put it on in daylight hours. And this isn’t even really because it’s so obviously meant to be boudoir music – the very sound of it evokes the amber hues of street lights and the not-quite-stillness of a city at night. This is particularly well-crafted atmosphere, full of interesting sonic details that follow the curves of the song rather than overwhelm it. Eliza Shaddad’s voice is understated through the entire thing, picking up a bit for the chorus but always staying in this low-key seductive mode.
Buy it from Bandcamp.