Don’t be fooled. Aesthetically EMA (aka Erika M Anderson widow from the recently deceased L.A-based Gowns) manages to somehow have all fathomable ‘uncool’ bases covered. She looks like she’s been shipped straight from MySpace (with added neon p&p), and I don’t mean the music section.
That’s what, I think, is so wonderful about EMA; she has you kicking yourself for your ignorant preconceptions. ‘Cause sonically she is a fucking feast. ‘The Grey Ship’, her first single, which although rather more epic in length and feeling than many of the other tracks on her debut Past Life Martyred Saints¸ feels almost Odyssian in its dramatics. It begins with delicate whispered vocals and an acoustic guitar, and ends with a pool of frenzied strings and crackled, broken “and nothing / and nothing”. A trajectory I’m sure everyone can sympathize with.
Live, inevitably, she rates a good 10.5 on the badass-o-meter, the extra 0.5 being for her violinist’s contributions, whose eyes didn’t actually open once while he was playing . I caught her at the Cargo supporting Scout Nibblet and surprisingly there were a good few people in attendance, considering her debut hadn’t yet been released, which is very, very encouraging. Donning a Marilyn Monroe tee cum dress she simply, without any nonsense, rocked.
From our Music Editor
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