St Vincent- Self Titled (2014)

St Vincent- Self Titled (2014)

What an amazing collections of tunes Annie Clark has brought us this time, a fifth record that holds nothing and that delivers a great variety of sounds, going from electronic warms sounds to frantic modern rockers, Clark clearly knows how to make interesting and dangerous pop, robust enough to put “supposed” pop modern divas like Lady Gaga to shame, pop is not an obsolete and prostituted vehicle, is an intelligent communication medium in the hand of the right people, and in the past year with people like Sky Ferreira and Lorde, and this year under St Vincent and Neneh Cherry it seems that intellect will finally emerge in the middle of pop, making it a less superficial genre this time around.

Opener Rattlesnake opens with distorted percussion, powerful beats and Clarks clean and dynamic vocals, Clark presents his little pop ditties in really innovative ways, opening wide the possibilities for pop, by being commercial and at the same time experimental, unconventional and sometimes weird, which give her a completely edge against disposable pop heroes and heroines of the day, form the beginning of the record, we can be assured that this is not an easy trip, but as it goes we are confronted by a combination of various odd colored sounds, an obvious reason why Annie got together in the past with another pop oddball, mister David Byrne for a completely astonishing record, and his frantic personality and intense and quirky hard edged guitar playing come out in naked in Birth In Reverse, a great tune that hit us merciless and reflects the charming yet dangerous personality of Clark and at least for me kind of remind me vaguely for seconds of the great Psycho Killer by Byrne`s great Talking Heads.

 Prince Johnny is not precisely the kind of tune I like, it breaks in a way the kinetic momentum of the album, but as pop tradition, it gives the listener a small breath, is not a bad song at all, and reminds me of the work of Lady Gaga, although I seriously doubt Gaga can make a record like this, or at least a song like this, and just for another spine chilling moment check out the hip hop arrangement for Huey Newton, street level, dark alley wise tune, with Clarks classicist execution to give a florid approach to the song, just for fun, digital fanfare continues in Digital Witness, a powerful song with winner written all over, a strong chorus and great sounds that would make Sign Of Time`s era Prince proud.

Check out I Prefer Your Love, a song that may sound precisely like Gaga covering Bowie`s Space Oddity, another strong showing, and definitely a quieter song which I end up liking a lot, followed by the dissonant Regret, with violent drumming and blaring guitars, another odd pop tune that puts pop inside out and shows Clark great songwriting skills on the spotlight, and left us totally unprepared for the sonic galore of Bring Me Your Loves, again taking us by surprise, making Clark output even more unclassifiable, with a song that might come up in an inspired moment out of Bjork`s Volta.

St Vincent again delivers the good flawlessly, taking cues from great moments in pop and turning them into something else thanks to Annie`s eclecticism, like the kind of Ob La Di Ob La Da inspired Psychopath, this self-titled recording ends up delivering great tune after great tune, Clarks possibilities seems boundless, and at this point the girls sounds incapable of making a mistake, she might be unfairly little known in mainstream pop, but after this recoding her name will start to acquire genuine fame, her team up with Byrne is prove that Annie is no fluke, the future of quirky pop is in her hands, and what a wise pair of hands are carrying the damn thing.