Radical Romantics, the latest album from Swedish synth-y and experimental pop artist Fever Ray, opens with an apology of sorts: “First I’d like to say that I’m sorry/ I’ve done all the tricks that I can.” The opening lines are a campy wink, acknowledging the steel drums—and pitch shifting—that are hallmarks of Karin Dreijer’s work Read More
Essays
SZA, Warning Shots, and Answering Your Own SOS
SZA’s “SOS,” the title track and opening track for the album of the same name, begins with a call for help. After a morse code distress call beeps off, a group of women’s backup vocals harmonize to sing, “Last night I cried.” Sampled out of Gabriel Hardeman Delegation’s take on “Until I Found The Lord Read More
Zola Jesus, Getting Lost, and Coming Home
On March 23, 2022, Slavic American experimental pop artist Zola Jesus released “Lost,” the lead single for her forthcoming album Arkhon. As Nika Rosa Danilova describes on her Patreon page, “i wrote lost after chopping up a sample of a slovenian folk choir singing a song from the bela krajina region where my ancestors are Read More
Land of Talk and the Intimacy of Healing
At close to one year of being in LA, I went to see Land of Talk live for the first time in five years. As I’ve written about before, Land of Talk are the band that I’ve grown up through adulthood with. Entering my life after Sleater-Kinney went on hiatus in 2006, LOT have been Read More
FKA twigs, Pandemic Dating, and Sex after Abuse
On January 14, 2022, FKA twigs dropped her first mixtape. “CAPRISONGS is my journey back to myself through my amazing collaborators and friends,” twigs declares in an Instagram post from January 6th. At the end of the post, twigs explains astrology’s importance for this project of reconnecting with herself: it’s my stubborn caprisun ass telling Read More