Grimes/Claire Boucher thread

i don't like it, but i think brad is right that it's a bit weird, not just weird for grimes. despite the song, the production isn't doing the naturalistic alt-indie singer-songwriter thing, it's hollowed-out, guitars and vox are tinny and weak and all the heft is in the low end with most of the warm mids scooped out. probably why it sounds poorly mixed to moka. i assume the effect is intentional considering grimes' production experience, but i guess might also just be that she's coming at recording acoustic instruments from a diy electronic background

I mean...

all this stuff being interesting is only interesting in the light of it being by Grimes and how invested you are in the fact that Grimes is interesting and important and therefore the stuff she does is interesting because it either plays into the existing Grimes mythos or goes against them
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, February 13, 2020 7:42 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

tbh this is an argument that could be made against any popular musician, it is impossible to have a reaction about something without context. which is why ppl are freaking out over grimes in the other direction as well instead of simply not being into the music that much.

― omar little, Thursday, February 13, 2020 10:53 AM (thirteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I don't think that's true! Some songs are just undeniable! Like you could not be interested or invested in Lizzo but you hear "Truth Hurts" and... That's a hit. Or I already found Kanye annoying at best (not yet repellent) but when I heard Black Skinhead I was like dang that's a song

reminds me of working at Barnes and Noble when we had the Portland Cafe Putomayo comp on in-store play

Or something closer to this song, I'm a non-believer in Taylor Swift but I checked out Red because of ILM and heard All Too Well and all you can say is that is a great well written, well recorded, well arranged song

i was overstating it but i think context is very important in terms of "ok here's a new song by this artist i have an opinion about" and that informs the reaction. but yeah sure some songs are undeniable. i guess which explains why for probably everyone there's been a reaction we had to a song based on certain expectations, that wound up being different than the reaction we have much later when our expectations are different, or gone, or removed from the context.

i liked black skinhead when i heard it in the Wolf of Wall St trailer, didn't know it was Kanye.

I don’t know if it’s those celtic sounding violins at the end but this sounds to me inspired by The Corrs, not Nashville.

i really like this song. maybe idk enough about 1998 indie rock but it doesn't sound that straightforward to me? the chorus is a drone and the production is kind of in its own world. if i heard this w/o context i would think that the artist is clearly trying to show a reimagined, decayed version of the original thing.

can someone post the 1998 indie rock songs that sound like this

sounds like she just mixed it using eq plugin presets

not indie rock jordan like alternative radio station annual festival second stage stuff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nntd2fgMUYw

right but the grimes song doesn't *actually* sound like that in anything except the most surface level ways

It's a good song, but I agree w Moka that the production/mix sounds awful (and not "interesting," the way I assume it's meant to sound).

Like, if this were actually "some b-list indie rock singer who got a song placed in a commercial one time" or "random ass bullshit on some "Indie Coffehouse Morning" Spotify playlist," it would probably be even better b/c it would have "professional"-sounding production.

for what it's worth I would like this all right if it were some random singer trying to be dolores o'riordan, which it could be

there's no way the wonderwall nod isn't intentional

the mixing on this record is a little wonky but i kind of love that, there's a really out-of-body dissociated feeling she maintains through the length of the album and i think it sounds great, especially on "so heavy." though the electric guitars do still sound like left-on vacuum cleaners

easily her best record for me

"idoru" is just... where did that come from

Idoru is one of the best ones in here I agree

the instrumental of "darkseid" confirms she's been listening to as much skinny puppy lately as i have

excited to pick this up Friday

Halfway through this, and 4æm is the first song I won't delete forever. Even if it does sound like the kind of d'n'b interlude bands like Oasis would use to fill out the runtime of a CD back in the late nineties. Other than that, this is really boring.

i'm a bit surprised it hasn't gotten widely panned. it's not thaat bad but it's still a real disappointment and factoring in her heel turn made a huge backlash seem pretty likely to me

it's not even fun to dislike it unfortunately

It's perhaps slightly better than feared? Ok final track. But mostly it reminds me how much great and thoughtful pop is happening at the moment.

even the stronger tracks like "idoru" are let down by the strangely amateurish mix and sound design

The album reminded me of the time a friend of mine said that Miley Cyrus was more artistically daring than Beyoncé, because she worked with the Flaming Lips

i like the melody of "you'll miss me when i'm not around" a lot but it feels a bit slight overall. there's some interesting stuff happening in the background but it never quite commits to any of it

This is good and everyone except Brad is wrong.

Another thing that struck me is this whole idea of celebrating climate change, isn't that what California did already?

it was a shame the completely bonkers concept she talked about in interviews basically didn't end up coming through at all

That seems good actually

Pitchfork Best New Music? And Brad likes it?
Sigh... I guess I have to give this album a fair chance now. (and here i thought "delete forever" was the final straw....)

warning i now think "delete forever" is the best grimes song

xp: With all love and respect to one of my favorite posters, please name something Brad doesn't like.

heh, the pitchfork review is the rare BNW that is also a burn

The disjunction between the disembodiment and the explicit riffage is enticing so far.

This is pretty good, it's the kind of album a Visions fan may have imagined her making with a bigger budget. If you prefer the turn she took with Art Angels towards massive energetic hooks, this may be a bit too much reverb-soaked meandering.

This might end up being a grower for me but at the moment I find the sound design and mixing in general very offputting.

i've spent months with it and it hasn't grown on me at all

First listen made me want to listen to Visions.

it's closer to Visions than it is to ArtAngels, a more slick and metallic version of the former. Really good at first pass (i never heard the leak). There's a deluxe version out there w/We Appreciate Power and several other tracks, which i don't think is seeing a CD/vinyl release unfortunately.

Ugh hearing IDORU and I’m getting annoyed by the lack of mid sounds. It sounds so hollow, like a really long intro. I’m waiting for the sound to have some muscle and it never does. I’ll assume it’s a conscious aesthetic choice but it’s perplexing to me why you’d like your songs to sound so skeletal.

I love Art Angels and Visions and the tracks in between but I'm just really not feeling this one aside from 2 or 3 tracks that I kind of like.

perhaps this will be the death knell of the hipster obsession with cold corporate visual and sound design. mids are what the human ear hears best so it makes sense she got rid of em for more impeccably “post human” vibe but that shit is increasingly played out, the whole accelerationist obsession with mutability is feeling like missing the point

sounds really good on airpods. #masteredforairpods ?

i just got my first pair of knockoff airbuds (their true name) in the mail yesterday! i will give this a listen on their intended format

perhaps this will be the death knell of the hipster obsession with cold corporate visual and sound design

yes, a few critical posts on ilx and it's all over

but will we use our power for good or evil?

I get the sense that this is meant to be listened to on large speakers as loud as possible

Ok I'm listening to this now despite all my resolutions not to and it's not terrible sounding at all? Sounds like grimes. I'm about halfway through and really wish there were stronger hooks, but production-wise its Grimes doing what she does best. Five years on from Art Angels though, I think it confirms that I'm just not that into her anymore. Like, my interest in her style has definitely passed.