Source: Radio New Zealand
A few weeks ago Spanish pop musician Rosalía sat down with the New York Times Popcast, for an interview that’s already been picked apart in multiple articles.
One response in particular seems to have inflamed the discourse: When asked if her new album Lux was asking a lot from listeners, she said “Absolutely. The more we are in the era of dopamine, the more I want the opposite.”
She was referring to online culture and the instant gratification that smart phones have enabled, an idea we’re all familiar with. But in this context, coming from a popstar with streaming figures in the billions, it feels slightly shocking.
. Björk proved it. Kate Bush proved it”, she went on to say, and it’s hard not to consider the implication about today’s mainstream musical landscape.
There’s no doubt that Lux is a lot. Rosalía sings in 13 different languages over sounds largely provided by the London Symphony Orchestra, with occasional outbursts of hyperactive rhythm. The music mixes pop with flamenco and neo-classical arrangements. It’s frequently operatic, and structured into four movements. The thematic framework is built around the lives of various female saints.
Some parts will test listeners’ desire to reach for their phones, with multiple songs simmering over minimal orchestration, more about channeling a certain feeling than grabbing your attention. When the beats make themselves known the combination brings to mind a certain aforementioned Iceland avant-popster.
And then, on the track ‘Berghain’, Björk makes an appearance. Soon after, experimental musician Yves Tumor joins in to bellow an unprintably explicit phrase. The orchestra underneath them builds to a fervour, as does a vocal choir.
It’s a lot of information within one song, and there are 15 here (18 on physical releases). Lux
Mainstream pop can still be challenging – see Charli XCX and Bad Bunny for recent examples – but I’d argue that, more than ever, the charts are mired in flavourless mush.
Perhaps that’s to do with streaming services manipulating our attention, or shrinking attention spans in general. Regardless, an album like Lux , that challenges its audience rather than spoonfeeding it, feels like a minor miracle.
More music to sample
An indie power trio of sorts, Snocaps finds Katie Crutchfield (Waxahatchee) sharing songwriting duties with her sister Allison, rounded out by MJ Lenderman (an acclaimed singer-songwriter himself). Fans of the Waxahatchee/ Lenderman duet ‘Right Back to It’ may be disappointed to learn the latter doesn’t sing here (instead providing drums and guitar), but it’s an excellent LP of scrappy tunes regardless, recorded off the cuff over the course of a week and all the better for it.
The Sunset Tree by The Mountain Goats
Reissued for its 20th anniversary, this remains a great encapsulation of John Darnielle’s songwriting: urgent, concise, and aggressively tuneful. Each song operates as a short story about his high school years, painful at times but often euphoric, always literate while begging to be sung along with.
– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
