Many of us can link a certain album to pivotal moments in our lives. Whether it’s the first record you bought with your own money, the chord you first learnt to play on guitar, the song that soundtracked your first kiss, the album that got you those awkward and painful pubescent years or the one that set off light bulbs in your brain and inspired you to take a big leap of faith into the unknown – music is often the catalyst for change in our lives and can even help shape who we become.
In this Love Letter To A Record series, Music Feeds asks artists to reflect on their relationship with music and share with us stories about the effect music has had on their lives.
Lola Scott – The Japanese House, Good at Falling(2019)
When I’m feeling overwhelmed I’ll walk to the beach and listen to The Japanese House. I find Amber Bain’s lyrical style will consume my entire focus. I’ll find myself pacing up & down the beach repeating the existential questions in Amber’s lyrics. If I throw all of my jumbled feelings into the music they somehow land in a more organised jumble after I’ve listened to this album.
I love how the widespread group vocal production style combined with reversed guitars washes over you and then breaks into dance-y choruses perfect for looking like a dickhead while you put a little skip in your step but I can’t help, when I’m in a chaotic mood, shaking out of my shit mood to this album. A little bit of dance walking in public feels super liberating especially in those moments when you feel a bunch of other things slipping out of your control. There’s something about the complexity of this tight flawless pop that feels like everything in under control.
The lyrics feel like Amber is gaining perspective of her own life from an onlooker’s perspective. I get the sense that she is a very self-reflective person and I find it’s a good way to reflect on my own life through her existential questions. She puts a lot of feelings into words that I didn’t even realise I was feeling. Like becoming self-aware when you release you ‘keep looking for something even though [you] know that it’s not there’ – ‘Maybe you’re the Reason’.
I love the unexpected moments in the LV melodies and the jagged melodic contours that somehow make sense with a tasteful amount of non-diatonic chords to catch your full attention. The unusual chords (for pop music) should be jarring but the strange changes are somehow still smooth af.
What I love about the production is the intense contrast between intimate verses and full soaring soundscapes when the chorus hits and the combination of manipulated live instruments and electronic elements.
My favourite tracks would have to be>
i saw you in a dream
f a r a w a y
Lilo
Everybody Hates Me Now – does this song describe anybody else hangover mood?
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Listen to Lola Scott’s latest single ‘Take Me Back’, here.
