Review Summary: Finally a star.
I don’t mean to offend the yeulies (for lack of a better term) on here, but I disagree with what seems to be the common consensus about Evangelic Girl is a Gun (egiag). I think that while imperfect in some ways, yeule’s most recent effort shows quality, maturity, and structure like none of their previous work. I’m gonna keep this short. The album is short. This review will be short (there will also be a lot of acronyms).
Do not get filtered by egiag. It might be their most challenging album to date, rewarding lots of listens, attention to the details, textures, and themes. We will be considering (1) quality, (2) maturity, (3) structure.
First of all, quality. I recall the strident vocals of Glitch Princess and the slow, instrumental points of Serotonin 2. Now consider the title track of this album, egiag. I don’t know what “evangelic girl is a gun” means, but it doesn’t matter. It is not only a standout track on this album, it is among their best songs ever. Poetic, flowing lyrics, with slick delivery. Further, Saiko initially sounds like fuzzy noise pop, but eventually reveals itself to be one of yeule’s most catchy songs yet, owing to the album’s replayablility.
With respect to maturity, I provide the example of 1967, the criminally underrated indie pop number. Yeule has, importantly, branched out from their traditionally bleak tone to give something of a history lesson about Singapore military service. Again, the delivery is just so slick and upbeat. I also see maturity on tgwshf and Eko, which to me are about the friction they face with finally becoming “famous” or at least well-known within their genre. On VV, yeule’s vocals reach new levels of sincerity and peacefulness. On this album overall, we experience a particularly rewarding conflict between yeule’s mature writing, bordering on actual poetry at points (merely alliterative at worst), and their super slick, indifferent delivery. We end up with a rebellious teenager who has grown up into a self-aware, introspective adult, while still managing to be cool.
I now conjure an image of softscars, after the novelty wears off. I understand that many of us probably feel a real personal relationship with that album. However, maybe you can admit that you wouldn’t bring it to a desert island as the only thing you can listen to for the rest of your life. And further, listening to Glitch Princess too many times just makes me feel sad. I will argue that egiag is the most re-listenable album from yeule so far, with Serotonin 2 being a close second. Considering the energy of Dudu (like beabadoobee), the catchiness of Saiko, the subtlety of VV, egiag establishes itself as somewhat challenging, consistently nice-sounding, and layered. It sounds good and it feels good, and this might feel unnatural for dedicated yeule fans.
My biggest issues with the album are that it is too short and that it contains filler (specifically, the opener and closer).
I also want to comment on most played songs (besides singles) on Spotify at the time of writing:
1. What3vr 487 k
2. tgwshf 321 k
3. Tequila coma 293 k
4. Saiko 255 k
5. VV 251 k
6. 1967 245 k
which is almost the inverse of the order I would rank them.
