Adam Green
Freeze My Love
Adam Green has a friend who has, in rigorous detail, recreated the studio equipment Serge Gainsbourg used to make his 1971 masterpiece Histoire de Melody Nelson. Of course he does. And being Adam Green, he has used this setup to record his own new album. Of course he has. Sad and windswept, an aide-mémoire to an imagined past, you could easily imagine that, yes, it is 1971 for ever; somewhere Gainsbourg is still potting the Chateau Lafite, and “fatty liver disease” just means an obsession with foie gras.
Mabel
Mad Love
What is this thing now where female pop stars keep asking: “Tell me can you hit it right?” Hit what, exactly? If Mabel’s lyrics feel like they’ve been heavily workshopped to ride the line between teen-pleasing filth and daytime radio play, they are no worse off for it. The PVC cladding may be more Ann Summers than Berghain, the production best described as “Spotify”, but with a quiet-loud dynamic tighter than a duck’s designer vagina, it’s a hit.
Pharrell Williams
Letter to My Godfather
It’s strange to think that Pharrell was the mind responsible for both Drop It Like It’s Hot and Happy, like if Jonas Salk had also patented pneumatic baby-maiming shears. An acoustic guitar ballad that relies heavily on AutoTune for any kind of differentiation, his titular letter is neither genius nor war crime. I could see it being a huge hit. I could see it disappearing tomorrow. You just never know, with the state of the general public these days.
Bat for Lashes
Kids in the Dark
In chillwave no one ever dies, they just become a more washed-out, Kodachromed, tie-dyed facsimile of themselves. Natasha Khan, who – if memory serves – used to write rich, diaphanous pop songs of the kind engineered to appeal to the Mercury prize judges, seems more of a Xerox of a Xerox. What was once witchy enchantment now resembles M83 playing in the next room. A shoo-in for Drive 2.
Taylor Swift
You Need to Calm Down
This is being touted as her LGBTQIA+ anthem, but I still can’t shake the sense Taylor is secretly working for the Republicans. Put simply, seldom has homosexuality sounded quite so orthodox and tedious. “Sunshine on the street at the parade / But you would rather be in the Dark Ages … / Cos shade never made anybody less gay”. This isn’t a gay anthem, it’s an anthem for people who pick up and put down the term “ally” like a Michael Kors bag.
