An Album With Its Soul Exposed & Its Finger On The Pulse
Perfect Tense
Fallulah
When I think of Scandinavian music my mind immediately conjures up epic soundscapes with whispered lyrics that draw you in slowly. Then, along comes Fallulah with her new album ‘Perfect Tense’ to blow those preconceptions out of the water.
The title track is a perfect slice of hi-energy pop that just explodes out of the speakers with an attitude, a chorus and a tune that Taylor Swift would kill for. In these days of fragmented and individual ways in to music you cannot tell what will be a hit. However, if Top of the Pops was still around one performance would have sent the song into orbit.
‘Social Club’ is a sassy and archly funny insight in to the bitchy world of the cool set talking ‘Bubblegum smack’, which is the perfect phrase to describe some of the snatched conversations you might hear in the mall or on the train.
‘Ghostfriend’ has a completely different feel with a smoky jazz club feel to Fallulah’s superb voice over an insistent beat that gives the song a real edge. It really showcases her talent as a singer and has a hypnotic and chilling effect on the listener in a distinctly Scandinavian manner.
‘Vandalain’ is a gorgeous song with a vocal performance and subject matter that reminds me of the great Judy Tzuke’s ‘Stay with me till dawn’. As with that classic song, you are plunged in to the end of a relationship, but you know that neither party really wants it to end.
The further you get in to this album, the more you realise that this is the work of someone with a true artist’s sensibility, one who will not compromise but one for whom accessibility is not a dirty word.
