I’m just gonna get the obvious out of the way - Grace Ives’ influences. From her clearly Lorde-esque vocals (and vocal patterns) and production (just listen to Avalanche!), to this wonderful mix of Lana Del Rey, Sky Ferreira and even Britney Spears in the tones and inflexions of her voice, she is unabashed wearing her influences on her sleeve and I mean, why wouldn’t she? This is (at least for me) my first time hearing an artist who is so clearly a product of alt-pop influences from the 2010s, a generation of music that is so recent and still going strong to this day (Lorde literally just released Virgin last year).
That being said, it would be so easy to screw this up and end up with a loosey goosey string of songs with no cohesive identity, but that is absolutely not the case here. This is mostly definitely a Grace Ives album, and it’s incredible. The production is shimmering and dreamy, and done so well that after hearing “Stupid Bitches” for the first time, I immediately rushed to add this album to my to-listen list.
This album doesn’t do anything too crazy, and I guess that can sometimes be a detriment to itself, leaving me wanting just a bitttt more at times, but it’s really solid and does what it set out to do really well, doing all its influences justice in a way that’s pretty clearly Grace Ives still. I’m really curious to see where she goes from here but for now, I’m probably gonna be having this consistently in my rotation for the rest of the year.
Fav Tracks: Stupid Bitches, Now I’m, Avalanche