Chelsea Wolfe Soundtracks Our Apocalypse On “Hiss Spun”

If the world really is ending, Chelsea Wolfe’s new album, Hiss Spun, is a fitting soundtrack. Wolfe’s music is not particularly political, instead focusing inward on the darkest parts of ourselves, yet this album feels weirdly timely. As massive hurricanes crash the coasts and we reach the precipice of nuclear war because two idiot leaders can’t stop trash-talking each other like grade-schoolers, the turbulence and doom in Wolfe’s music reflects a dark world that is on the verge of complete chaos.

That sense of foreboding pervades every second of Hiss Spun, which impressively manages to be even darker than her previous effort, Abyss, which felt like a concept album about being stuck in a pit and not seeing the sun for 20 years. This is a massive, beautiful monster of an album — the kind that makes other rock albums feel ineffectual and tame by comparison. It pummels the listener with loud guitars and crashing drums while Wolfe’s powerful voice and her poetic, gothic lyrics sometimes struggle to be heard over the din.

What I love about Wolfe’s music lately is how unrestrained and feral it is. She seems to put every bit of herself into every song and note, and it makes these relentless journeys into the void cathartic and meaningful rather than sounding like empty noise. She also has no qualms about embracing drama and theatricality, which stands out in an era where a lot of music is self-consciously “chill” and relaxing. Every song feels like it has life-or-death stakes as Wolfe struggles to prevent her soul from sliding into complete darkness.

Like Abyss, this album uses dynamics heavily, and it’s easy to get lost in its thunderous loud parts or the bewitching folk-inspired sections. But beneath all of that, Wolfe shows an underrated ability as a relatively traditional songwriter who writes real hooks. “16 Psyche,” “Vex” and “Static Hum” are all not so far away from sounding like 90s radio hits, but Wolfe adds enough weirdness and personal touch (plus some growling vocals from Aaron Turner on “Vex”) to make them stand out from other alternative rock imitators. The album’s last track, “Scrape,” is rawer and even more intense than the rest of the album, as Wolfe describes a destructive relationship in blistering detail with less production and noise to hide her pain.

While Hiss Spun is bleak, there is always an inspiring quality for me when an artist really seems to throw all of themselves into the music they’re working on. Wolfe is among the best at that, and her charisma and songwriting ability make her one of the most captivating artists out there. So much music is content to sit in the background; Hiss Spun grabs the listener and doesn’t let go.

Cold Beat – “Chaos By Invitation”

It’s fitting that the first song on Cold Beat’s newest album, Chaos By Invitation, sounds like no other song the band has made before. “In Motion” is a long, spacious synth ballad that has a feeling of infinity to it — listening to it makes me feel like I’m alone on a boat in the middle of the ocean, looking at an endless horizon. There is an ambiguity in the track that has become one of the hallmarks of Cold Beat’s sound. On one hand, it sounds peaceful and relaxing to be in the ocean, but it’s also frightening to be solitary in a vast expanse.

This is only the third album for the Hannah Lew project, but it has already grown and evolved in ways that few artists do in their entire careers. “In Motion” is a strategic choice as the opening track, because it officially signifies the shift hinted at on their previous album, Into the Air, which started out as familiar guitar-driven rock before ascending into synth-pop territory halfway through. Chaos By Invitation focuses heavily on those synths, and it becomes primarily a solo vehicle for Lew, who recorded it with less collaboration than their previous albums.

The more solo nature of the album and the restriction to mostly synths would seem to imply a more narrow and claustrophobic sound. “In Motion” proves that wrong right out of the gate, and the rest of the album continues to showcase Lew’s ability as a diverse and creative songwriter who is emboldened by working with different resources than she has in the past. “Thin Ice” and “Don’t Touch” are more classic Cold Beat tracks with a spikier sound and anxious lyrics, but then there is “62 Moons,” another dreamier track with evocative lyrics about a relationship that ends with a “fade to black.”

With fewer collaborators, Lew’s singing stands out more on this album than it has in the past. She sings in almost a classical or operatic way, but adapts her voice to the different styles on the album. She reaches a more high-pitched coo on “False Alarm,” which sounds vaguely like a Grimes/Simple Minds collaboration, but she sounds more like an android on a dense electronic track like “Black Licorice.” One of the last songs on the album, “Strawberry Moon,” is like a synthed up version of a classic c86 pop song, and Lew’s voice fits snugly into its upbeat dreamy vibe.

What I most appreciate about Cold Beat is what makes them one of the trickier bands to write about: nothing about their music is obvious. The style they play is difficult to describe in buzzy genre words (electronic-synth-goth-punk-pop?) and Lew’s lyrics, while not being completely cryptic, don’t really lend themselves to the type of easy interpretations that are the bread-and-butter of music blogging. The only obvious parts are how the band changes with every release and how much thought is put into every part of the album, from the construction of the songs to the sequencing. Lew’s project is a model for what rock music should be, and the success of Chaos by Invitation reflects her continued growth and evolution as a songwriter.

EMA – “Exile in the Outer Ring”

The suburbs are a recurring theme in pop culture, and media about them usually centers around a familiar trope: the idea that, beneath the well-trimmed lawns and tranquility, there lies a darkness within the people, who are portrayed as unhappy or desperate even in their seemingly wonderful surroundings. My fear was that EMA’s new album, Exile in the Outer Ring, would cover similar thematic territory as lazy satires like American Beauty and center on that dissonance. Instead, she has made an album that is much more nuanced, much more real, and one that accurately cuts to the heart of a specific type of American existence.

That existence is people living in what she dubs “the outer ring,” an idea she explained in a recent interview with Jezebel:

To me it’s kind of like the outskirts of a city and what would have once been thought of as the suburbs. The idea of the suburbs is kind of outdated, that kind of affluent, white, homogeneous area. But now in Portland and I think a lot of European and American cities, the inner city is really where the wealth is concentrated and everyone else is getting pushed out. So I’m seeing these spots that I’m calling the outer ring, which could either be a version of utopia or dystopia.

I thought the concept was rather nebulous when I just read her explaining it, but what makes Exile in the Outer Ring such an effective album is how it comes to life in the music. All you have to do is listen to one of the songs and it’s easy to see what the “outer ring” is and what it’s about. It’s conveyed not just through the lyrics, which are full of specific lyrical details like riding in the back of Camrys or people standing outside of casinos, but through the music itself. The grinding industrial sound and squealing guitars evoke images of worn-down buildings and grimy streets, and EMA’s voice captures a feeling of resentment and despair that could boil over at any moment (on some of the more aggressive tracks, like “33 Nihilistic and Female,” it does).

The other obvious pitfall of an album like this is that it could come off as EMA writing about Those People and the Way They Live, which was a problem I had last year with PJ Harvey’s Hope Six Demolition Project album. She avoids this by inserting herself into the narratives, and using details from her personal life and upbringing in South Dakota that make these songs live and breathe instead of reading like attempts at journalism. I also like that the album isn’t just portraying “the outer ring” simplistically as some nightmarish hellscape. It skews darker overall, but there are also moments of prettiness and humanity amid the ugliness, which makes the album feel very true to life.

This album is also a nice progression for EMA, who blew me away with her debut album, Past Life Martyred Saints, which I loved because it was an album that was unafraid to get ugly and confront the darker side of human nature. This album is reminiscent of that one in its fearlessness, and it also incorporates parts of what she did on her second album, The Future’s Void, which felt more external and political. Exile in the Outer Ring is like a combination of those two: it’s a bracing blend of personal and political songwriting that is provocative and dark, but also full of life.