Here's a formula for you: take one lead singer from a moderately successful rock-band (The Jealous Girlfriends), add a shout-out from perhaps the most outspoken and commercially successful American rap artist in the world (Kanye West) and throw in a debut album produced by one of the hottest properties in modern music (Dave Sitek). Then multiply that by being picked up by one of pop music's most influential independent labels (XL Recordings). The product = Holly Miranda's "The Magician's Private Library". And if she wasn't sure about getting noticed before, then sitting alongside stable-mates The White Stripes, Radiohead, Sigur Rós and Beck in the label's catalogue will probably do it. That's not to say that her music won't be making waves though. Because what we have here is a collection of other-worldly pop songs, cloaked (although submerged is perhaps more appropriate in many cases) in an darkly electronic veil spun by the aforementioned Sitek, who also gets some TV On The Radio buddies to chip in on one or two tracks.
In terms of content, the album hops about from playful orchestral pop ditties ("Forest Green, Oh Forest Green" and "Sleep On Fire"), dark, buzzing songs of despair and unhappiness ("Slow Burn Treason") and woozy psychedelic-fused treatments of medical disorders ("Joints"). "Forest Green, Oh Forest Green", the first single from the album, is a rather odd slice of playtronica that melds Miranda's own pop sensibilities, joyfully wandering brass (ably supplied by Sitek pals Antibalas) and, in this case at least, Sitek's minimalist drum lines. The listener quickly discovers, however, that Sitek's influence and indeed presence is keenly felt throughout the album, none more so on "No One Just Is" and "Slow Burn Treason". The former, a dark, distinctly unsettling 60s-fused theme tune, features a buzzing guitar line that whirrs discontentedly, buried deep in the mix, dynamic James Bond strings and a throbbing, syncopated bass married to looped, obscurist vocals from Miranda. Such a description may ring more than a few bells for anyone who has listened to another recent Sitek-produced album, this time from Telepathe, which also courses with a similar dark energy, albeit with a heavier emphasis on synth-ridden electro-pop. "Slow Burn Treason" crackles with the same intensity of "No One Just Is", but toes a decidedly more ethereal line. The vocals once again remain tantalisingly out of reach - although love, loss and betrayal nevertheless hold sway ("Who's gonna feel you/who's gonna lead you/who's gonna want you/who's gonna hold you/who's gonna love you) - whilst the percussion, pops, crackles and fizzes in turn, the dark synths swirl ominously and Kyp Malone adds his distinctive falsetto to proceedings. It's deeply unsettling, desperately sad but nevertheless utterly captivating. And not for nothing does it sound like the most TV On The Radio track on the album, particularly the "Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes" era and "Dreams" from the aforementioned album. This determined sense of unease returns later on with "Canvas", albeit for matters at the opposite end of the relationship spectrum. A disconcerting, off-beat soundscape of almost unrecognisable guitars, electronic ticks and simmering drums, it reveals itself to be a stripped, darkly erotic ode to a lover: "A narrow escape only/by your caress/was it something in your eyes/or was it in your lips/that made me feel sane?" The album could be criticised for the occasional disinterested or incomprehensible lyric, but "Canvas" dismisses this instantly with a vocal performance that positively burns with desire. It begins a little lackadaisical, but becomes gradually more... well, let's just say insistent, before "climaxing" (ahem) with the repeated refrain "Curl yourself around my frame" and collapsing back, seemingly exhausted, with the lazily murmured "Our canvas is still blank."
There is an electric beauty running through this album, albeit of the murderous sort that leaves one wondering where the dagger in the back (or indeed the heart) is going to come from. The already mentioned "No One Just Is" burns with a maniacal anger in which Miranda seethes at a relationship gone sour, "This love does no-one justice" before announcing that "Anyone with two cents would pull the ripcord". And if the intended audience hasn't quite grasped the fact of the matter, the track closes with Miranda cooing the coldly menacing "When it comes you'll be warned/you'll be warm". She's clearly not a woman to be trifled with. And then there's "High Tide", almost the opposite in terms of emotional investment. Demonstrating fizzy high-hats and slick soulful keys in abundance with layers and layers of synth for company, it's supremely cool but coldly detached dance-pop. It's still just a little bit perturbing though.
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"Waves", an elegiac drifter of a song feels like it should be winsomely heart-warming, but turns out to be a dreamy yet mournful pop song, a deep-set melancholy running through its veins, which asks the broken-down lover "Why you, why you let it all/be like some prison in your mind/it doesn't need to be" before leaving us with the unanswerable, "Where do the waves go, my love?" The final line of the song - "Ooh, we wait so long, babe/to become just one heart" - is delivered in such a way that there can be little doubt that she is still waiting. Even "Joints", all horn-tinged soaring euphoria, turns into a bleak and quasi-suicidal story of her fibromyalgia: "I can feel it in my joints/it aches and creaks and there's no point/in growing old". The contrapuntal nature of pop à la Miranda, deeply buried and determined, is never more evident than in the meanderingly luxurious "Everytime I Go To Sleep", all playful brass and kitchen sink percussive patterings, which reveals, having stripped away the heavily produced layers, a darkly bitter heart: "Everytime I go to sleep/I kick and scream and dream a little bit/violently awakening to what's real is really bullshit".
The world of "The Magician's Private Library" is dominated by the darker shades of the palate, but nevertheless finds time to let in a little light. The closer, "Sleep On Fire", dynamic orchestral pop, not unlike something The Arcade Fire would throw out, rolls along on an urgent 3/4 beat but more importantly rests far more on Miranda's talents as a musician and vocalist than the majority of what comes before. The drawing back of the dark electronic drapes, pulled across so much of the album, makes the track perhaps the most human, and certainly the most endearing, of the lot.
Indeed, the final track of the album raises an interesting question. After all, Sitek's handiwork is so blazing clear on the record, so undeniably obvious to the listener's ear, that one begins to wonder how much is Miranda and how much is Sitek (cf. Danger Mouse's restrained production on "The Last Laugh" by Joker's Daughter). The "Sleep On Fire" EP, released during the summer last year, features an early demo version of "Joints", which began life as a delicate, finger-picked acoustic number. It's an interesting insight into quite how much the album that appears here is almost a collaborative effort between Sitek and Miranda. There's no denying it, in my opinion, but that shouldn't detract from Miranda's work. These are her songs of bitterness, failure and anguish. And regardless of the respective involvement of each individual, it still remains a curiously enjoyable night-time collection of often other-worldly, electronica-infused pop songs. At times whispering to the heart, at others fucking with the head, the album throws out a heady and intoxicating potion of troubling pop that's very hard to resist.
Holly Miranda on Myspace
Holly Miranda Official Website
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