Review Summary: My house is wild // come over tonight
Being is probably the best produced album I’ve heard all year. This statement serves not to discount the excellent production on
Morbus Chron’s
Sweven, as the spacey production values on that record lend it an excellent atmosphere; rather, it serves to explain just how beautiful and lush the production on this album is. The drum machines are crisp, the bass wubs and whoomps and wobbles along, the synths stutter and sing, and Calia Thompson-Hannant’s voice is at once both clear and fuzzy. This fuzziness is the result of near-excessive delay, reverb, and vocal layering.
And my oh my! While the production alone warrants a listen, Thompson-Hannant’s vocal performance here is the real treat. Her voice isn’t conventionally sexy, but something about the way she shapes words renders me unable to use any word other than “sexy” to describe her singing. Many singers tend to belt 100% of the time, but Thompson-Hannant avoids that trap deftly. She really knows how to use her voice, oscillating between belting during powerful verses and restraining herself during less intense sections.
Between the dizzying synths and dazzling singing, there are more than a few standouts from Being. Opener “Good Thing Bad Thing” sets the mood for the album with aplomb, while “Salty Tear” claims one of the best lines on the album: “Most of my friends are medicated just like me.” Perhaps the most immediate track, however, is the only track from earlier EP
Hello to make it to the LP: "Don't Leave It To Me." Honestly, every track is well-written and deftly produced, so picking standouts is a somewhat futile task.
Being clocks in at a modest thirty-nine minutes, so there is no excuse to ignore this record.
