This Wasn't Meant For You Anyway

This album has been added to 2 public lists:

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  2024 Top 20

  Adam Wood

  It took me a minute to dial into this record, the second full-length release from Croydon singer/songwriter Lola Young (not to be confused with the incumbent Baroness of Hornsey). Across ten (and a half) tracks, she chronicles both relationship drama and inter-personal power struggles, and also negotiates her own internal landscape. Part of that is an effort to explain (perhaps to herself, and to the world) a diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder.

  Both musically and lyrically, there’s a captivating balance between smooth surfaces erupting into jagged edges. Prominent single ‘Messy’ catalogues some of these dichotomies explicitly, but they’re present—in one respect or another—across the whole record. The sharp elements (be it a lyrical vulgarity or musical swerve) hit harder because they come surrounded by—for the most part—some very pleasant R&B-inflected pop. Included in there are some superb melodies, such that even when things get dark, it’s hard not to have a good time.

  ‘Conceited’ in particular wormed deep into my brain, to the point that I would get a shiver at the sound of its opening bass line coming on shuffle. That track is an excellent microcosm for the album as a whole: assured, rich vocal performance; direct, occasionally confrontational lyrics; an all-timer of a beat that I expect to hear sampled on hip-hop records in years to come. Oh, and a super-cathartic, grungy explosion of a guitar interlude to boot. This one will stick with me for a while.

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  Currently..

  Martijn van Exel

  messy