5 new releases we love: Frances Quinlan branches out, Dan Deacon returns, and more
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Frances Quinlan Photo: Julia Khorosilov
Dan Deacon, Mystic Familiar
[Domino Recording Co., January 31]
A month after Dan Deacon released 2015’s Gliss Riffer, the album’s “When I Was Done Dying” video went viral. The animated clip, which loosely depicted a corpse pulsing through natural and extraterrestrial environments to symbolize anxiety, directly informs follow-up Mystic Familiar. Throughout the LP, which abounds with nature-based song titles, Deacon reckons with his nerves, strips his voice of digital effects, and advances the dismembered frenzy of Gliss Riffer while faintly recalling the chirping moshes of his 2007 breakthrough, Spiderman Of The Rings. His amorphous, unfiltered melancholia equally pervades the hypersonic whirl of “Arp II: Float Away,” the starry-eyed piano bounce of “Become A Mountain,” and the mournfully spasming “Sat By A Tree.” The latter track comes with another corpse video and a request that’s easy after hearing Mystic Familiar: “If when I die you think of me, think of my best first.” [Max Freedman]
Waxahatchee, “Fire”
[Merge, January 22]
Katie Crutchfield is back with another Waxahatchee record. “Fire,” the first single from St. Cloud—named after her father’s Florida hometown, and written after getting sober—signals a glowing new direction for the Alabama-born songwriter. Crutchfield has said “Fire” is “meant to be a bit of a personal pep talk. If I can love myself unconditionally, then I can move through the world a little easier.” And aptly, the song’s easy gait, head-nodding bass riff, and soft synth create a vibe akin to the moment sunlight blankets the world after a storm has rolled out. While the first single might be named after the most destructive classical element, the record’s sound generally shares more in common with air—it feels breezily triumphant, sometimes nearly weightless, like a burden has been lifted, even when it’s clear that weightlessness was hard-earned. St. Cloud, out March 27, has a silver lining. [Matt Williams]
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