Aldous Harding walks towards a brighter future with her new album Designer. Photo / Clare Shilland.
Aldous Harding walks towards a brighter future with her new album Designer. Photo / Clare Shilland.
Aldous Harding - Designer
There's something that can't be explained about Aldous Harding's music. Even when she's stripping things back to mere acoustics, or crafting a song around just one repetitive piano line, there remains something beguiling and completely unknowable about what she's created. On Designer, her third record, Hardingis exploring worlds new to her and her listeners; the songs are lighter and more uplifting than anything she's done before, and the results are simply extraordinary.
Harding's Party (2017), albeit excellent, was not always an easy listen - it was an album of almost unrelenting darkness. On Designer, Harding's chords and tempos face steadily towards the sun. The jangly piano and warm acoustic guitar on the title track are the most immediate example of this; when Harding asks, "Whatever was your angle/With that visionary shimmer?" you can almost hear the smile on her voice. That line alone could sum up the sheer beauty of Designer; Harding seems to be seeing the world with brand new eyes, feeling along its lines and curves with admiration, forever searching for the mysterious root of its design.
That sense of awe permeates the record. The hypnotic Zoo Eyes introduces two Hardings: a lost traveller in the verses, singing at a hauntingly deep pitch. Almost comically, Harding conjures the frightening feeling of being in the world, untethered to anything: "What am I doing in Dubai?" But in the chorus, her voice is high, pretty and full of wonder, as she traces different lines of beauty in the natural world: "All rain is beads/That drain to where the Mother shell meets the sea."
Some of Designer's most affecting moments are when Harding lays out her insecurities and inner conflicts. The stunning, minimal piano track Damn opens with two lines that speak to anyone who's ever felt they take up too much space: "Can you make a space on the seat?/A box-like shape for a silly woman?" Later, it's felt even deeper in an open-ended apology: "Sorry I was late and you didn't get your weekend".
But even at a moment where it seems Harding is recounting a failure, there's hope within the tune. Damn could read as bleak, but it's imbued with such warmth that it's hard not to feel as though Harding is making peace with a time gone by. On Weight of the Planets, the following track, she carries past trauma with her: "I can be anything/But I've got the weight of the planets". But it's not stopping Harding from walking toward a brighter future.
Artist: Aldous Harding Album:Designer Label: Flying Nun Verdict: A stunning, strangely uplifting record from New Zealand's most beguiling songwriter.
- By George Fenwick
Lizzo - Cuz I Love You
Lizzo performs onstage at the Music Tastes Good Festival at Marina Green Park in Long Beach, California. (Photo / Getty Images.
Lizzo's latest offering kicks in with a soulful cry as she belts "I'm crying / cuz I love you", before heavy bass and brass kick up the dramatics and a playful piano melody floats under Lizzo's talk-rapping.
Then there's that chorus - reminiscent of the highest points of Beyonce's Lemonade and Rihanna's Anti but with even more punch than both.
After that, the album is wall-to-wall bangers with dance bop Like A Girl (which sounds like what Katy Perry probably wishes a Katy Perry song sounded like), Juice (which has already been tipped to be the biggest hit of 2019), the unreservedly joyful self-love anthem Soulmate, and the club anthem waiting to happen, Tempo (featuring the one and only Missy Elliott).
Even the slower songs are ready-made hits, making up for what they lose in tempo with pure soul and vocal talent. Jerome is old-soul blues meets 2019 lyricism as Lizzo shows a casual lover the door because she deserves better.
On Crybaby, she gives context to the title track, on which she is overwhelmed by the love she feels for someone; and on Lingerie she gets sultry and sexy - a rare move for Lizzo, who soars over chord changes here with ease.
Cuz I Love You offers the best of a bunch of musical worlds as Lizzo serves technical skill, hip-hop influence, pure pop, rap elements, and attitude - as well as a perfectly-timed lesson in loving yourself.
More importantly, you get the feeling that after years of self-doubt, dimming her glow in multiple girl groups and never quite opening up fully, Lizzo has finally arrived and she is glorious.
Artist: Lizzo Album:Cuz I Love You Label: Warner Music Verdict: Finally, Lizzo has arrived in undeniable style.
