High scoring EDM? How… thrilling!
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[7.25]
Iain Mew: I still fondly remember the first time we covered Nero on the Jukebox, and ice hockey players crashing into each other and J-Pop and MONSTER FISTS all come back to me on listening to “The Thrill” (too bad they missed Sochi again). It’s a formula, but it’s a strong one.
[7]
Scott Mildenhall: Last year, Nero made one of the largest and most Nero-like singles in a while: “Satisfy”, steam-powered galvanic electrolysis paying no regard to what those words actually mean, because they just sound so cool. By their standards, then, this one doesn’t really sound that much like the inside of a pinball machine brought to life. It’s more a persistent slog through adversity toward an ineluctable goal, every low growl a tide to be swum against and a punch swung and evaded; like a blitz through a particularly dystopian Tekken. Come the end, Alana wins! But with everyone else left dead in her wake, it’s rather lonely.
[8]
Micha Cavaseno: It’s weird how one can regret making choices on dubstep. Look, it’s lame, but I really spent many a year preferring the stoicism of Mala or the gloom of Loefah. At the toughest, I’d do maybe Starkey’s spastic ravey shudders or the harsh bad-boy steppers of Vex’d. But BROSTEP was the enemy, ’cause like, duh! Of course, now so much of post-dubstep has become awful Brits playing with the music of urban America and sounding so unfunky, vomit-inducing house mediocrity, or worse… albums with hired guns from Cuba for “connoisseurs.” So now I can’t help but appreciate the harder forms in all its glories. You guys were right, you won! I’mma go jump into my coffin now, ’cause this kills.
[8]
Alfred Soto: Jessie Ware hurtin’ and emotin’ on too typical build and release dance mania.
[4]
Katherine St Asaph: I’ve never quite been able to justify my love of Nero above their more sugary, more emotive, less broverstuffed, more defensible peers, so their sudden adoption by tastemakers is delicious vindication. The synth intro suggests Johnny Jewel aspirations, Alana’s frost-crystal verse suggest Nicola Hitchcock aspirations, both of which would be for Nero — gasp — a new direction. Happily, the chorus respects the First Law of Nerobotics: one shall never mention one’s feelings without immediately following it up with a world-crushing riff to illustrate. There’s an idea that brostep is for boys and poppy EDM is for girls, which is bull; feelings are beefy and unsubtle and will pummel your whole life, and they sound a lot like this.
[7]
Will Adams: A giant riff matched with a giant vocal presence that’s on the verge of tearing herself apart. A clattering drum loop. A chorus that comes in a measure early to slam you on the ground. There’s no title more appropriate.
[8]
Brad Shoup: The Skrillex co-remix of “Promises” was the best dubstep-as-pop song I’d ever heard. It was stark; it cut through the bone. That was Alana Watson’s doing: she set devastating heights that her band were forced to tunnel through. This time, the theme is abandon to love, but a smidge over the relieved side of the border. So the synths quack out their approval after the Link to the Past synth melody sets the tone; Watson dives into a riptide only to be spat out onto the shore. This must be love.
[8]
Megan Harrington: I live in an extremely tiny studio apartment. It’s miniature even by studio standards, unable to contain anything described as “full sized.” As a consequence, I’m perpetually scanning blogs for ideas about how to keep the place functional. I know I’m not alone because fully one fifth of Apartment Therapy’s daily posts are devoted to the beauty of small spaces. If people aren’t actually doing more with less, they’re certainly inspired by seeing it rendered visually. Often, despite knowing there’s not enough room in the living area (calling this eye-catching furniture situation a room seems like a stretch) to comfortably host a guest of non-feline persuasion, I’m seduced by the gimmick of clutter reduction. In reality my apartment is beyond cluttered, I moved a box labeled “ill fitting clothes” in four years ago and still haven’t parted ways, but I like the idea of minimalism. “The Thrill” is a few chords and a scrambled vocal but it sounds so powerful, almost spelled out with stars. This is minimalism writ large.
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