by Fatti Frances
In a strange kind of time warp release schedule, Fatti Frances’ studio polished debut album, completed over a year ago, finally appears with little fanfare direct to bandcamp, six months AFTER the release of its follow-up, the lo-fi home recorded “Sweaty” EP. Nevertheless, a year on her ‘old’ stuff is still way ahead of the rest of us…
Recorded over a solid month in the studio with engineer Morgan McWaters (WORNG), Lie For Me sees Fatti push up the sheen on her skewed r’n’b to the point where it could segue comfortably out of a Beyonce or Mary J Blige record, but after a few seconds you’d definitely click that something unusual was going on. Even in its most straightforward pop moments, such as slow jam opener “Ooh Baby, Baby”, there’s a dark, icy undercurrent to the music, the sweetness of the melody contrasted with an unsettling sense of dread and paranoia that makes it feel closer to something like Yoko Ono’s “Walking On Thin Ice” or Siouxsie and The Banshees “Red Light” than anything you might hear on pop radio.
The production is truly impressive, with huge womping bass lines, skittering drums and hypnotic whirring synthesizers all hanging majestically in their strange dubbed out space, but it’s the songs that really make this an album to come back to. From the driving paranoia chant of “She’s Watching” to the breathy lilt of “When I Close My Eyes”, they seem to whisper around your subconscious and will you back into their strange, icy world.
by Richie 1250 - Stone Love
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