The Upcoming
  • Cinema & Tv
    • Movie reviews
    • Film festivals
      • Berlin
      • Tribeca
      • Sundance London
      • Cannes
      • Locarno
      • Venice
      • London
      • Toronto
    • Show reviews
  • Music
    • Live music
  • Food & Drinks
    • News & Features
    • Restaurant & bar reviews
    • Interviews & Recipes
  • Theatre
  • Art
  • Travel & Lifestyle
  • Literature
  • Fashion & Beauty
    • Accessories
    • Beauty
    • News & Features
    • Shopping & Trends
    • Tips & How-tos
    • Fashion weeks
      • London Fashion Week
      • London Fashion Week Men’s
      • New York Fashion Week
      • Milan Fashion Week
      • Paris Fashion Week
      • Haute Couture
  • Join us
    • Editorial unit
    • Our writers
    • Join the team
    • Join the mailing list
    • Support us
    • Contact us
  • Competitions
  • Facebook

  • Twitter

  • Instagram

  • YouTube

  • RSS

CultureMusicAlbum reviews

Ladyhawke – Anxiety

Ladyhawke – Anxiety | Album review
31 May 2012
Naomi Couper
Avatar
Naomi Couper
31 May 2012

I always seem to shy away from synths and self-proclaimed revolutionary pop stars. I just don’t really get on with the whole concept of electro, but here, I stand well and truly corrected. Ladyhawke’s new album Anxiety is fantastic.

The album is the follow-up to her 2008 self-titled debut and was originally due to be released on 19th March. After nearly four years since her last LP, Ladyhawke (aka Pip Brown) has produced a well-crafted album of the same chart-worthy quality. It is a secure recipe for a hit record. With the success of her 2008 single My Delirium, the New Zealand songstress is here to show she is not just a one hit wonder, as her new album proves.  Ladyhawke, with her sulky demeanour, has hit gold again. Not many artists can achieve this consistency of monumental records, but then again not many pop women take their stage name from a 1980s fantasy film either.

The production is manicured and glossy, juxtaposed with the unrefined vocals that Brown can’t help but exude. The lyrics are delivered in an almost monotone 80s fashion. Brown’s voice rings out with the same coquettishness that shimmered in the tones of Debbie Harry. It is sultry and alluring, with power and control. 

Anxiety is bold, strange and brimming with melodic, dramatic songs. The 1980s influences she fronts on tracks such as Sunday Drive and Vaccine gyrate confusingly between the appropriated, clubby electro-pop of Vanity and The Quick And The Dead.   The result is a complicated message that offers a meld of glitzy choruses as well as dated synthesiser riffs which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it seems.

Black White and Blue, the first single from Anxiety has been available for download since 19th February. The music video is inspired by the classic 1978 film The Life Of Laura Mars. Black White and Blue is a striking insight into what Brown’s music is all about: memorable melodies couched in an aura of bitter-sweet synth-drenched melody. A warm, electro-fuelled heart sings deep within a body of more-than-just-pastiche revivalism. It seems that Brown is pushing all the right retro buttons.  

Highlights on this contagious, beat packed album include Girl Like Me and Gone Gone Gone. The retro influences are thrust into your face, but she has captured all the best bits of these influences and distilled them into something fresh. Hook -laden choruses and chirpy upbeat tweets take the 80s dance scene and mould their reputable credentials into an exciting modernisation that screams top-pop excitement. 

Anxiety musically glistens and is truly a piece in itself and shines with glorious accomplishment – an intelligent pop album that covers the all too familiar territory of going out of your mind. A punchy, well thought out record that displays Brown’s ability to keep true to her musical roots.

Songs like Black White and Blue and Blue Eyes defy modern pop’s building blocks and far from conform to any sort of commercial regime, but in some obscure realm they have the potency and power to take over the charts, one by one.

Naomi Couper

Anxiety is released by Modular Recordings on 25th May 2012.

Watch the video for Black White and Blue here:

Related Itemsreview

More in Album reviews

Florence and the Machine – Dance Fever

★★★★★
Ronan Fawsitt
Read More

Warpaint – Radiate Like This

★★★★★
Catherine Sedgwick
Read More

Arcade Fire – We

★★★★★
Ronan Fawsitt
Read More

Blossoms – Ribbon Around the Bomb

★★★★★
Georgia Howlett
Read More

Memorial – Memorial

★★★★★
Mae Trumata
Read More

Fontaines DC – Skinty Fia

★★★★★
Jasper Watkins
Read More

Girlpool – Forgiveness

★★★★★
Charlie Peters
Read More

Patrick Watson – Better in the Shade

★★★★★
Catherine Sedgwick
Read More

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Unlimited Love

★★★★★
Georgia Howlett
Read More
Scroll for more
Tap
  • Popular

  • Latest

  • TOP PICKS

  • Ladies’ fashion: Seven wardrobe staples for summer
    Fashion & Lifestyle
  • Julius Caesar at Shakespeare’s Globe
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Operation Mincemeat at Riverside Studios
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Viagra Boys at the Forum
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • The Buddhist on Death Row by David Sheff
    ★★★★★
    Literature
  • Florence and the Machine – Dance Fever
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • The Road Dance
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • Rhino
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • The Innocents
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • Benediction
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • Florence and the Machine – Dance Fever
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • Warpaint – Radiate Like This
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • Operation Mincemeat at Riverside Studios
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Viagra Boys at the Forum
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • “There’s something very tender if you reconnect with your parents when they’re falling into pieces”: Gaspar Noé on Vortex
    Cinema & Tv
The Upcoming
Pages
  • Contact us
  • Join mailing list
  • Join us
  • Our London food map
  • Our writers
  • Support us
  • What, when, why
With the support from:
International driving license

Copyright © 2011-2020 FL Media

Rock the House Awards 2012 at the House of Commons
Ladyhawke launches new album with Brick Lane industry party