It’s not bad, as such — and there are occasional excellent tracks, such as the rocket-ride tribal drum’n’bass of 4ÆM
Grimes, Miss Anthropocene ★★★
For all the apocalyptic visions, grandiose conceptualism, high-tech sonic manipulation, outré costumes, modish witchery, multiple personas, arch media baiting with her billionaire boyfriend and all the rest, Grimes is still essentially a dork.
When she emerged from the weird end of the Noughties online electronic music landscape, where semi-serious lo-fi genres such as “witch house” and “seapunk” abounded, she always seemed kind of goofy.
And though her musical progression has been a steady accumulation of expensive-sounding production, that same “drama student on acid” silliness is still there in bucketloads.
On her first album since 2015’s Art Angels, that production is immense. There are vast sub-bass tones, waves of electronic orchestration and swathes of reverb and echo.
Unfortunately, it is counterproductive. Where early on Grimes’ self-taught electronic production was quirky and amplified her persona, now she seems swamped by it. The portentousness dominates, and the odd, off-beam humanity is left as just a trace.
Maybe that’s part of the concept, and appropriate to her end-of-the-world themes, but ultimately it makes the album feel like a technical exercise more than creatively satisfying.
