ALBUM REVIEWS
Girl In Red’s cultural impact in the last six years is impressive: two critically acclaimed EPs steamrolled her to status of queer cult icon – her name and music becoming queer Gen Z code for lesbianism – a debut album co-produced by Oscar-winning, Grammy-winning Finneas and then being handpicked by Taylor Swift to open up on her record-breaking, billion dollar grossing world tour. She’s had a crazy run so far, and now she’s back with her major label debut, ‘I’m Doing It Again Baby!’
Her first release in three years, the record chronicles Girl In Red’s – moniker of Marie Ulven – experiences with love, relationships, art and mental illness. Opening track ‘I’m Back’ is a sickly sweet and bitingly sarcastic announcement of Ulven’s grand return following a particularly bad episode: “Time doesn’t stop for a sad little girl” she states plainly, noting that when overwhelmed with the dark she believes she “will laugh” and that “it’ll pass”.
Ulven opts for a mixture between twinkling slow jams and faster, more rock-infused tracks. The title track wriggles with energy, breathless as it depicts the return of the singer’s self-confidence and “swagger”. On ‘Ugly Side’, slithering basslines and screechy vocals make for an unnerving, Gothic backdrop as Ulven laments the fact the people she loves the most have to put up with her worst traits – it’s catchy and creative, though somewhat jarring when she, er, spirals off to chat about starting a podcast.
She’s at her best when she yearns – she approaches love with a sweet and endearing sentimentality (‘New Love’), or with a self-aware sense of humour (‘Phantom Pain’). Taylor Swift’s influence is all over ‘Too Much’, a shiny pop ballad examining the way an ex’s jabs impacted her self-esteem
The LP’s strongest moment is closing track ‘*****’, in which Ringheim tackles fame and the music industry through her admiration for New York City, the ’60s, and Warhol’s Factory. There’s not much to chew on for the majority of the record, as Girl In Red plays it safe – especially in comparison to contemporaries such as Chapelle Roan or Sir Chloe – the majority of the record sees her sitting safely within the parameters of her previous sound. There’s some flicker of musical expansion, but no commitment.
‘I’m Doing It Again Baby!’ is a fine album; it’s fun and sweet, if a little bland. It’s a pristine pop record that takes few risks and leaves little room for error – though it might be more interesting if it did.
ALBUM REVIEWS
It will not shock you that, on an album appropriately titled ‘Hyperdrama’, Justice have absolutely put their laces through it. The French duo – made up of Xavier de Rosnay and Gaspard Augé – have surely sensed an opportunity with their first album in eight years, their brand of maximalist electronic thumpers sounds increasingly enticing in the post-whisper pop sphere, and having won fans in soon-to-be collaborator The Weeknd. There’s also the curious wrinkle of this being their first album since countrymen Daft Punk called it quits in 2021; comparisons are understandable – the duos are entwined by their Ed Banger label boss Busy P (who once managed The Robots) – but simplistic. Where Daft Punk made music for the heart and head, Justice’s rock-influenced imagery and abrasive material were more about taking one to the gut. This is their chance to put clear daylight between the two and, goodness me, have they taken it.
Speaking to NME in 2023, Busy P gave a ringing endorsement – well, he would – and said that ‘Hyperdrama’ gave him “goosebumps” and compared it to their 2007 debut ‘Cross’. Then came the announcement of starry guests: Tame Impala, Thundercat, Miguel. The material got its first live airing over the past fortnight at Coachella with a raved-about new stage production. The final teasers from de Rosnay are typically oblique: “A record is not meant to be fully understandable the first time you listen to it,” he recently told The New York Times.
‘Hyperdrama’ is a blockbuster release that meets the hype: flashy, over the top and keen to make a spectacle. It’s not a course correction as such, but smartly moves away from the proggier climes of 2011’s ‘Audio Video Disco’ and 2016’s sometimes-dull ‘Woman’. The band have mentioned the influence of gabber – a Dutch subgenre of hardcore techno – on their new material, but it mainly sounds like they’ve reconciled with the the sound of their debut, inviting pop tendencies to enter their own brutal world and not the other way around.
It’s evident on the record’s first two singles, the yin and yang of ‘One Night / All Night’ starring Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker on vocals, and the pummelling metallic chrome of ‘Generator’. While the aforementioned makes the most of a typically aloof but catchy Parker melody by pairing it with a pounding beat, ‘Generator’ is the finest track on the record, a track so deliciously stuffed with melodic switch-ups and garish production that it’s almost arrogant in displaying their capability. It’s the hardest studio recording they’ve release since cult favourite ‘Planisphère’, a 17-minute long bonus track from ‘Audio Video Disco’; to top it off, ‘Generator’’s music video features the images two cyborgs ripping the flesh of each other in the throes of passion. Mon dieu!
The remainder of ‘Hyperdrama’ follows suit, deftly weaving between vocal collaborators and pop structures. For every ‘Saturnine’, a slinky R&B jam featuring Miguel, there’s ‘Dear Alan’ which shows flashes of the French-touch sound they dabbled with in their early days. The Flints – an emerging duo from Manchester – shine on ‘Mannequin Love’ and Eritrean-born, Amsterdam-raised Rimon justifies the decision to bring in new vocalists on this record, occasionally a weak-point of ‘AVD’ and ‘Woman’. The song suite between ‘Moonlight Rendezvous’, featuring a saucy sax solo, and ‘Saturnine’ flows spectacularly.
Where those two past albums made up ground in the live space – as heard on 2013’s ‘Access All Arenas’ and 2018’s Grammy-winning ‘Woman Worldwide’ – their fourth album leaves nothing on the table. Viewers of their two Coachella sets will notice how the songs are already evolving and morphing into something gnarlier, but this studio version is equally realised and thrilling.
‘Hyperdrama’ is the type of release that the dance space – if you could even slot Justice in there – seldom sees. They duo show a passionate reverence for the album format, from the artwork that took over 18 months to create to the songs that boast both style and substance. It’s one of 2024’s most engrossing listening experiences.
