Album Review: LoneLady – Former Things (Warp)

Julie Campbell started work on the third LoneLady album, Former Things, when she took up a residency at Somerset House’s studio in London in 2016.

Her previous well received albums, 2010’s Nerve Up and 2015’s Hinterland, had been written, played and recorded in Manchester at her home studio and an abandoned factory. The move has continued her development as an artist with a clear and singular vision who produces music with drum machines, synthesisers and sequencers that engage your mind and your body.

At Somerset House in the former Naval Rifle Range, LoneLady set up a studio and immersed herself in the use vintage electronic technology. The tracks retain a link with Manchester by using riffs, beats and soundscapes that remind me of 1980s Manchester post punk bands such as Joy Division/New Order and A Certain Ratio. They are also influenced by other electronic music pioneers of that time, such as Cabaret Voltaire, Kraftwerk, Prince and early Hip Hop.

The three tracks released prior to the album all have impressive videos. The title track, Former Things, has captivating scenes of LoneLady playing with a child, representing her younger self, in green open spaces in Manchester. The effect is made more powerful by the video replicating Super 8 film stock and when you know that these are locations from LoneLady’s childhood. The wistful lyrics evoke a long gone golden age of childhood “I’m not who I used to be”  and “I used think I could do anything but that has gone away from me.”  The music has waves of synthesiser and a delicate constant drum beat that give the song an upbeat quality.

Many of the tracks on Former Things juxtapose positive, uptempo and danceable music with lyrics that are direct and downbeat. There are recurring themes in the lyrics of uncertainty, memory and the experience of time passing. The light electro pop of (There Is) No Logic is paired with dark lyrics about confusion, fear and death, “Turning in a circuitry all we are is memory…All your days will turn to rust.” The video takes a cue from the lightness of the music with playful on-screen lyrics in vibrant comic book colours.

The final video released to date is for the track Fear Colours. This video uses a simple and effective loop of dash cam video from a car driving around a street light lit Manchester on a deserted night. The music has moving bass lines over hissing drum machine beats as LoneLady bravely faces up to her fears “I move in premonitions, wherever fear goes, I go.”

Time Time Time captures a feeling of life passing by too quickly by using the title as a desperate repeated phrase. The lyrics ask “How much more can I take” and the sense of urgency is accentuated by the squelchy bass tones, piano arpeggios and varied drum beats. In contrast the next track, Threats, has a slower rhythm of cold layers of synthesised drum sounds. The vocals build up, stop and then re-start to add to a feeling of unease and uncertainty. On Treasure the lyrics tell us she has “…got to find some kind of treasure” which is answered by off kilter bass sounds.

The lyrics of the opening track The Catcher meditate on childhood dreams. A reverberating bass is replied to by a blast of short scratchy guitar chords while synthesisers bubble and ring, The lyrical themes of dreams, uncertainty and time passing are returned to in the final track Terminal Ground. Over stuttering electronic drums LoneLady shares her uncertainty about the future “I don’t know what’s going to happen right now” but urges us to “..not to let go of our dreams.”

On this album LoneLady moves forward artistically as she delves deeper into the use of 1980s electronic sounds. Former Things is an album of original post punk dance tracks that is packed with musical and lyrical ideas without ever becoming cluttered. The songs have catchy hooks, thoughtful lyrics and layers of sound to keep you interested and, when played in a nightclub, to keep you dancing.

John Bradbury

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