There is a clever conundrum at the heart of the music found on You Can’t Spell Sweetheart Without Thea, a juxtaposition of music that is often seductive and serene yet juggling lyrics that explore many of the most difficult and hard-to-talk-about themes of the modern world in general and the complexities of the artist’s own life in particular.
It’s a disarming and decisive way to get messages across: these subtle, supple, and soulful songs (in every sense of the word), a soft shell that contains such hard and spiky realities.
Take opener, “Baccarat Rouge,” a song that comes on like a 60s chamber-pop ballad, Thea Taylor’s demure voice drifting and dancing over heady sonics whilst speaking in a thoroughly modern language. But it is perhaps the excellently titled “I Never Met a Dollar Bill I Didn’t Like” that merges the timely with the timeless, the sweet sonics of the jazz cafe blending with more modern sounds.
There is a poignancy about “The Invisible Man,” a song whose theme of loneliness seems to become increasingly relevant day by day in a world where we often miss the crucial fact that loneliness runs deeper than simply being alone and where we confuse connectivity with community, followers for friends.
You Can’t Spell Sweetheart Without Thea is a gorgeous and original blend of dream pop and classic sounds, bedroom sonics that have gone out into the big wide world. It is also the sound of an artist reclaiming her own musical identity after having found success very early, an artist shrugging off the weight of expectation placed on her by record labels and fans alike.
But more than anything, it is a unique album full of killer songs and clever arrangements, thoughtful messages and relatable themes, an album for our times, but one that blends the comfortingly familiar with the totally fresh, and you can’t ask for more than that from an artist.
Facebook
Soundcloud
YouTube
Instagram
