Cate Le Bon takes this week's title of Single of the Week.
Single of the Week
Cate Le Bon
Daylight Matters
It’s a joyous day when Cate Le Bon announces new music. Le Bon’s not disposed to wholesale stylistic makeovers, but ‘Daylight Matters’ illustrates the Welsh singer’s commitment to gradual evolution. The crinkly strangeness that surfaced on 2016’s Crab Day remains in effect. ‘Daylight Matters’ is a carefully synth-swaddled alt-pop number about being in love and coming to terms with absence. Le Bon’s voice is effervescent, despite the situation’s seeming finitude.
KOKOKO!
Malembe
Riding on a wave of transatlantic hype, Kinshasa’s KOKOKO! return with ‘Malembe’. This one is streaked with tension; a prodding techno beat duels with traditional Congolese percussion and stringed instrumentation. A synth comes and goes, but the production remains limber. The lead vocals are chanted rather than sung. It’s not amelodic, but a sense of urgency overrides the need for precision. Call and response vocals enter in the song’s final third, injecting a sense of unity.
BATTS
Folding Chairs
‘Folding Chairs’ is a spare acoustic number that finds singer Tanya Batt exhausted from “working hard for no return”. To cope, she’s listening to Bon Iver and surrounding herself with friends. The titular folding chair represents impermanence and Batt’s perpetual readiness to pack up and move on. This is supported by her penchant for slipping from melodic grace to speak-singing; a sort of reality-check vocal technique.
Broke House
Extra Indigo
This is front-to-back tragic. Luke Costelloe starts by referencing a relationship he was in as an 18-year-old. It’s not my place to adjudge the validity of teen romance, but the call-back seems indicative of how desperately forlorn he’s feeling. ‘Extra Indigo’ isn’t mopey, though – it features such beautifully sophisticated lines as “I don’t wanna know what went on/Same old song/It rang my head like a gong” and the measured guitar-led instrumental is deftly wrought, benefitting from spacious production. It feels like a vital act of self-objectifying; having one’s own flaws revealed through the effort of reaching out to another.
