Painless (studio album) by Nilüfer Yanya

From cestuneblague 03/19/2023 03:11

It may not have the louder, bolder bursts of expression of her debut, but it's no less eclectic- if anything, it spans almost the entire modern musical capsule with bits of the darker edge of sophisti-pop and angular new wave compositions of the early 80s, the distorted guitar smoke-outs and urban r&b of the 90s and a lot of the downbeat indie-rock rhythms & folky-tronica touches of the aughts. In streamlining her sound, she gives her compositions a more alluring, textured, rather sad tension than just straightforward hopping from one singular emotion to the next. Midnight Sun, with it's delicated un-coiling to a slow, orgasmic blanket of static definitely stands out of the crowd on first listen, but it's the more taut and (yes) tense look into longing and the mess of supposedly satisfied desire and self control of L/R and Stabilise that really grow on repeat listens. A very post-quarantine album, it's best when you let it come to you rather than trying to find the "greatness" right away, which in many eludes a mostly excellent album like this as it half-consciously notes it's coming from an artist still figuring herself out.

'PAINLESS' is spare and brooding, with crunching electronic drums and fizzing alkali guitar and synths. I enjoyed myself overall, as I thought Yanya's writing had a harsh beauty to it, Wilma Archer's exec production was very consistent and I have a soft spot for the flourishes Bullion added to the sonic palette. Overall however, I have to agree with Arthurknight that it's really very good but perhaps doesn't surpass that.

From Arthurknight 05/20/2022 00:14

Nilufer Yanya are consistently good, but I can never get SUPER into it. Their best stuff on this album (imo), just like in their previous releases, are the songs that sound like In Rainbows covers, like "midnight sun" here – they're good covers though.

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