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singer Elif
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Edgar Berg / Sony Music
Album of the week:
Elif - "It finally hurts again"
In two completely superfluous songs at the end of her fourth album, Elif Demirezer reveals how easy she could make it for herself if she wanted to.
They are called "I think of you" and "Why are you lying to me" and are most reminiscent of those heartbreak hits that unfortunately all too often make it into the charts despite the greatest banality: woman is left, heart bleeds, guy becomes missed even if he was an asshole.
The two songs are not bad, they have well-functioning hooks and elegant, very contemporary beats, because Elif is not only a singer with a deeply emotional, very recognizable voice, but also a good songwriter, maybe even one of the best of the German ones pop has to offer.
For her, such songs are finger exercises that less talented singers would break their hands with.
In the pre-Spotify days, this would have been called an album filler.
In other words: With 14 or maybe only 12 instead of the tiresome 16 songs »Endlich tut es wieder weh« would have been an even better album.
Because like hardly any other German pop singer, Elif masters the difficult balancing act between mass appeal and street credibility: The 30-year-old began her career as a candidate on the TV casting show "Popstars", released two solid German pop albums, won prizes and went with Peter Maffay on an unplugged tour.
In 2020, however, she reinvented herself as an emo rapper with her best album to date »Nacht« and had a top ten hit in a duet with rapper Samra.
In her songs, which are now based on beats instead of guitars, she also wrote about her conflicts, which she often perceived as a double life, as a German-Turkish woman born in Berlin with the conservative values of her parents and Islamic culture.
For her appearance at the Free European Song Contest 2021 on ProSieben, where she performed her defiant song "Alles Helal", she had her eyes painted black to draw attention to violence against women in Turkey.
In the same year she took part as a coach in the casting show "The Voice of Germany", and last year in the pop star cuddle format "Sing mein Song".
Claim or sell-out, coolness or cash flow?
So those were the questions that arose before the release of Finally It Hurts Again.
The album wants to combine both, just like Elif's declared role model, Taylor Swift, manages to do again and again.
An unfair comparison, of course.
But there are moments, such as in the surprisingly swinging acoustic guitar-played killer ballad »Mein Babe«, in which the eternally melancholy protagonist in Elif's songs dares a wink, a mischievous or sarcastic, if not anarchic, gesture or remark.
Even the album cover, which is pleasantly rebelling against any doll-like quality, signals a self-ironic punk attitude, which unfolds in the break-up night of »When I Die«: »I hate everything about you, except your dog«, she sings in the song, das contains a snotty indie rock song at its core.
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Elif
Finally it hurts again
Label: Jive
Label: Jive
approx. €15.99
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03.02.2023 5.55 p.m
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A similar hybrid is also the central piece of an album that is about empowering oneself to deal with the pain of separation and injury as a basis for creativity and success, about transforming oneself from the victim of male ignorance to a sovereign actor: »You sing my songs, Because you didn't love me," says the agitated "Because you didn't love me": If she hadn't been abandoned, she wouldn't have written her songs and wouldn't have been a celebrated pop star: "You didn't love me, so love me now Everyone.« That comes pretty close to the emancipatory, swift attitude of revenge.
Elsewhere one wishes for more
female pressure
instead of pressure on the tear duct.
Elif's greatest strength remains the bittersweet midnight ballad that interweaves urban rap motifs and melodic refrains.
This is shown by another song double at the beginning of the album that is not shallow at all, but essential: In »Bomberjacke« and »Passenger Seat«, two successfully released singles beforehand, Elif is once again very close to her existential, black-clad goth girl self .
Drifting melancholy through the streets of her city, intoxicated by romantic longing and the Berlin air that smells of missing, she ponders the smells and spirits of her most formative feelings, the wounds that her hunger for life and thirst for adventure have left in her soul - and uses them to shape her emotional disarming pain music.
(7.7)
Listened briefly:
The Waeve - »The Waeve«
Blur co-founder Graham Coxon was once described by Oasis boss Noel Gallagher as one of the most talented guitarists of his generation, which isn't nothing considering the two bands' once legendary rivalry in the '90s.
It is all the more surprising that he can now also be heard on the saxophone, for example in the artfully canted indie pop song "Kill Me Again" or the ballad "You're All I Want To Know", which staggers between Sixties melt and prog rock.
There's a lot of amazing stuff on the debut of The Waeve, a joint band project by Coxon and Pipettes singer Rose Elinor Dougall.
Already »Can I Call You«, the first song, leads on the wrong track with a gentle impression, before the track breaks out in the middle into motorically chugging krautrock.
Coxon's penchant for more rustic experiments of the 1960s and 1970s has been common since his soundtrack work for the Netflix series »The End of the F***ing World« and »I Am Not Okay With This«, hence the punk-esque tracks like "Someone Up There" rather the exception in an ambience that channels its moods from the folk experiments of Sandy Denny or John Martyn, charged with a lot of modular synthesizers and mysticism from the Pink Label era of Island Records.
Of course, Coxon also plays the guitar (and the medieval cittern lute) extensively to Dougall's Druidesses' singing.
that channels its moods from the folk experiments of Sandy Denny or John Martyn, charged with a lot of modular synthesizers and mysticism from the Pink Label era of Island Records.
Of course, Coxon also plays the guitar (and the medieval cittern lute) extensively to Dougall's druid singing.
that channels its moods from the folk experiments of Sandy Denny or John Martyn, charged with a lot of modular synthesizers and mysticism from the Pink Label era of Island Records.
Of course, Coxon also plays the guitar (and the medieval cittern lute) extensively to Dougall's druid singing.
(8.0)
Young Fathers - »Heavy Heavy«
You wouldn't think that Alloysious Massaquoi, Kayus Bankole and G. Hastings, the three Scottish Young Fathers, recorded it all alone in their home studio, given the West African-inspired, wild block party at the beginning of this album: »Rice«, » I Saw« and »Drum« impressively demonstrate once again why the band is considered one of the most influential and original in the British conscious hip-hop scene.
The three tracks pull the acid spirit of Primal Scream's "Screamadelica" out of the Thatcherism exhaustion of the late eighties with sweaty rhythm pressure and campfire chants - and anchor it in the depressive socio-political mood of the present.
The album title "Heavy Heavy" doesn't just mean the basses and old-school hip-hop grooves that are used here,
but also the melancholy after two years of pandemic, Brexit and fears for the future.
"Give me a bulletproof vest," says the nervous "I Saw," and this is probably not meant as a defensive defense against criticism of her support for the controversial BDS initiative's boycott of Israel, but rather as a recognition that life over the past five years hasn't become any less uncomplicated or carefree since the last Young Fathers album: "My back's still broken from life's effect", says "Holy Moly".
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
"Give me a bulletproof vest," says the nervous "I Saw," and this is probably not meant as a defensive defense against criticism of her support for the controversial BDS initiative's boycott of Israel, but rather as a recognition that life over the past five years hasn't become any less uncomplicated or carefree since the last Young Fathers album: "My back's still broken from life's effect", says "Holy Moly".
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
"Give me a bulletproof vest," says the nervous "I Saw," and this is probably not meant as a defensive defense against criticism of her support for the controversial BDS initiative's boycott of Israel, but rather as a recognition that life over the past five years hasn't become any less uncomplicated or carefree since the last Young Fathers album: "My back's still broken from life's effect", says "Holy Moly".
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
and this is probably not meant as a defensive defense against criticism of her support of the controversial BDS initiative's boycott of Israel, but as a recognition that life hasn't gotten any easier or more carefree in the past five years since the last Young Fathers album: »My back's still broken from life's effect," says Holy Moly.
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
and this is probably not meant as a defensive defense against criticism of her support of the controversial BDS initiative's boycott of Israel, but as a recognition that life hasn't gotten any easier or more carefree in the past five years since the last Young Fathers album: »My back's still broken from life's effect," says Holy Moly.
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
that life in the past five years since the last Young Fathers album hasn't become less complicated or more carefree: »My back's still broken from life's effect«, says »Holy Moly«.
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
that life in the past five years since the last Young Fathers album hasn't become less complicated or more carefree: »My back's still broken from life's effect«, says »Holy Moly«.
But even with a broken back, you can rave, shake and make noise until the hardened tendons relax again.
When the band takes a deep breath, in the sacral »Tell Somebody« or in the world music mumbo-jumbo of »Ululation«, Coldplay's (hypo)holiness lurks in this Northern Gospel Soul.
(7.5)
Sham-e-Ali Nayeem - »Moti Ka Sheher«
Like her colleague Moor Mother, Sham-e-Ali Nayeem is dedicated to healing historical, post-colonial wounds of discrimination and uprooting.
The lyrics of the American Muslim with Indian roots on her second album are mostly from her book of poetry »City of Pearls«, published in 2019, but unlike before, it is no longer just about identifying pain, but about processing memories , Mindfulness Practices and Hope in Diasporic Feeling.
Sounds strenuous and like social justice activism set to music, but Nayeem's poetry has nothing pamphleteer-like about it, instead whispering suggestions with a provocative, sensually subtle sharpness.
A highlight of the album, which is musically oriented towards electronic pop and trip-hop by Anne Clark, Portishead or Massive Attack,
Backed by vocalists like Gabriela Riley and Tough Gossamer, »Goddesses And Doormats« is: a salacious echo of Machist master painter Pablo Picasso's pronouncement that there are »two kinds of women – goddesses and doormats«.
"I feel reverence for the doormat," Nayeem sings, "beautiful underdog."
Three conspiratorially pulsating minutes of respect for the divine in every woman, no matter where and by whom in the world she is neglected and marginalized.
(7.3)
Wild – »Cliché«
Elif (see above) and Wildes could probably easily agree on the bomber jacket, shiny black on the outside, bright red on the inside, even if they come from very different musical worlds.
Jana Pantha and Jenny Tulipa come from Munich and Zurich and have been making music together since they were 15.
Similar to the attitude-related duo Zucker from Hamburg, it took forever until they released their first real debut album (there was a mini-album a few years ago).
NDW is a very, very broad term that most people – unfortunately – associate with Markus Mörl or UKW or other fun steel pools.
Luckily, the Wildes quote the post-punk variety of German eighties pop: the electronically elegantly gliding »Konsum« is reminiscent of »Tango 2000« by Nothing,
the beastly »Leger in schwarz« is more reminiscent of the ideal, »Schwarzes Gold« dances the fetish with DAF.
"Bellezza" and "Toccami" are mischievous Italopop minimalisms.
Clichés about the way women have to make music are lustfully smashed by two full-time professional vamps with pithy guitar riffs and precisely cutting synth lasers.
Cool facade on the outside, predator enclosure on the inside.
(7.6)