Tag: pop

TRACK | Unity – Big Dreams #2

5/5 golden merles

“Big Dreams, don’t know where to put them / up on the shelf”

Big Dreams is a sandcastle made of sugar.

It is 25ft tall and even when the water comes in as a tide that afternoon it takes 8 days to dissolve, fully one day more than it took some lord to create the world and it’s peripheral, irrelevant universe (as it is alleged).

Albert Einstein was quoted as saying about science, probably, “It should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler.” And that is also a pretty good way to think about pop music.

A distillation and honing of hooks into their purest form. Unity have made here a good example of that phenomenon.

I prefer the demo version posted here to the one that later appears on the subsequent S/T LP. Fortunately the world is big enough for both.

TRACK | Naomi Punk – Gentle Movement Toward Sensual Liberation

5/5 golden merles

In somewhat keeping with the aside, this is an instrumental track on an album that otherwise features exceptional vocal production and performances.

And within that context, after the also superb track Burned Body, Gentle Movement toward Sensual Liberation lands with the most wobbled grace and poise.

An enclave of singing synths deliver a kind of orchestral chamber pop, built around two well textured, extra-strength melodies.

TRACK | Getatchew Mekurya – Akale Wube

5/5 golden merles

Here is a slight departure from the guitar-driven lo-fi, but the hiss of the tape remains, the synth-organ still chirps it’s guttural encouragements, and the hooks are everywhere present.

Akale Wube is an all time great track, for me, not only of Ethiopia, and not only of the saxophone, both of which I am not very familiar. But of the thing called music, generally. It wails.

Generally in art I am wary of outright abstraction, and view it with suspicion, as a salve to established, unjust hierarchies, and through it’s broad interpretation offering undue comfort to the enemy.

But not in this instance. At least for four minutes and eleven seconds I take Getatchew’s (lack of) word for it.

TRACK | Cindy Lee – Heavy Metal

5/5 golden merles

Cindy Lee’s Heavy Metal is an exemplary track for conveying that lo-fi does not have to mean anti-lush or lacking in vibrancy.

There is great richness and subtle hooks everywhere here, built into the vocal melody and the winding bass. The drum fills and phasing between segments are pristine and luxurious set pieces.

It’s all pretty captivating and contorts the space of any room into which it is freed.

Find further spectral ache and alchemy at the bandcamp.