It’s spectacular how yeule, actual title Nat Ćmiel, has turn out to be one of many boldest voices in hyperpop given the style’s boundary-breaking customary. Their 2022 album ‘Glitch Princess’ garnered vital acclaim as they documented their rising derealisation, physique dysmorphia and drug use. It was a considerably uneven report, oscillating between smooth emo-pop standouts like ‘Don’t Be So Onerous On Your Magnificence’ and ending on a shocking four-hour ambient observe; clearly not for the weak of coronary heart. On ‘smooth scars’, yeule trades hits and misses for refined, focussed swings in a challenge that confronts their humanity in superbly sudden methods.
The traumatic overdose and dying of an in depth pal diffuses by means of the whole report, and it has clearly modified yeule in methods each philosophical and creative. That’s evident within the opening observe ‘x w x’, which lures you in with its music field intro then explodes right into a refrain of raging shoegaze guitars. Yeule’s sometimes smooth, breathy voice descends into tormented screaming as they admit defeat: “Comfortable scars on my pores and skin/Silicone, porcelain/I’m not one in every of them/Love you ‘until the tip”.
Yeule continues to experiment with ’90s-inspired guitar tones by means of the lens of their posthuman id, avoiding simple nostalgic revivalism. There’s the sludgy guitar tones slicing throughout yeule’s fragmented AutoTune on ‘dazies’, while the Pixies-inflected fuzz on ‘software program replace’ enhances their equally unstable thoughts. Maybe the eeriest observe is ‘ghosts’, whose mild acoustic strums soundtrack yeule at a disturbing nadir within the report: “For those who held a gun to my head/I’ll snigger as an alternative.”
Probably the most participating performances they offer on ‘smooth scars’ are present in its most explicitly digital tracks. ‘Inferno’, a bouncing gradual burn with plucky, nocturnal synths, sees yeule pledge their timeless love in hushed, intimate whispers. Album spotlight and title observe ‘softscars’ is pure synthpop recalling influences like M83 or Porter Robinson, as they chant the devastating means of coping with grief: “I can’t love you such as you love me babe, smooth scars”.
The album doesn’t all the time stick the touchdown; the grandiose ‘cyber meat/vampy’ is undercut by a touching acoustic quantity whose whole title relies on a cheesy Aphex Twin pun. Nonetheless, it’s a formidable step-up from an artist who was already working miles forward of their friends. ‘smooth scars’ could be an emotionally excruciating expertise, however it finds yeule connecting with their humanity in ways in which appeared unimaginable only one yr in the past.
Particulars
- Launch date: September 22, 2023
- Document label: Ninja Tune
