Music 17 INTO THE WILDERNESS BY ELIZA DELF: ALBUM REVIEW by Tom manning
At the start of this academic year, I had the chance to interview the singer songwriter Eliza Delf. Six months on and Eliza is back with her debut album which I have had the chance to exclusively listen to before its release on the 13th May. I can safely say that this album is a must listen. Eliza’s music is steeped in folk imagery and sounds while having an operatic feel to it that allows Eliza to showcase her truly phenomenal voice. The album is produced by the folk producer Jon Loomes and this professional production makes for an incredibly well-crafted and executed album. Into The Wilderness is a fitting title to this album. The tracks are sonically vibrant, filled with instrumentation that
leaves you discovering more with each listen. The songs feel very well paced throughout the album and at no point do they feel unfinished or over staying their welcome. Songs such as My Familiar and If She Were To Fall are empowering, focusing on female defiance. Throughout the album there is a clear recurring theme of female empowerment that comes through very strongly. As I was writing this review, I was considering which songs I could use as examples for Eliza’s vocal performances but, if I’m being honest, every track showcases her vocal talent. On Heaviness in the Head, Eliza delves into indie folk rock which makes for a welcome change of pace. The drums on this track sit perfectly behind
Eliza’s refrains of ‘no-one will ever know’. My personal highlight from this album, however, is In The Court of the Queen of Strangeness. The title itself feels similar to a late 90s Bright Eyes song. The track begins with these dramatic violin strings that feel like we are about to witness the closing moments to an intense drama. The harmonising backing vocals create added layers to the track and give it a haunting atmosphere. Into The Wilderness is set to be released on the 13th May on all digital platforms and with physical copies available too. In the meantime, you can listen to Eliza’s lead single Howl which is available to stream on all platforms.
How have we gone from The Beatles to BTS? By Sienna norris
I’m sure at one point in your adolescence you had that one boy band you were obsessed with, especially if you’re a female. I recently watched the documentary Eight Days a Week, about The Beatles, and in most of the performance clips, teenage girls’ or “Beatlemaniacs” screams were louder than the music, I got to thinking about my generation and the chokehold bands like One Direction had on us, so why do teenage girls go so nuts over boy bands? There’s actually a pretty simple answer; because it’s what boy bands are designed to do, yet it hasn’t always been like this. Contrary to popular belief, The Beatles were not the first boy band to exist, the earliest example of a boy band were barbershop quartets, in the early 20th century. In the fifties, Doo-Wop became popular and paved the way for R&B, heavily influencing modern day music. For the remainder of the century, boy bands progressed from disco
to alternative rock and pop, perhaps the most notable era for boy bands were the nineties, groups in this time tended to provoke extreme reactions from their female fans, to name a few: Take That, NSYNC, Backstreet Boys, and since, the definition of a boy band has hugely shifted. It’s no secret that boy bands tend to be young and attractive, each member has their own unrealistic persona that’s projected onto their easily-influenced audience, each of these personas represent the different ideal male partners for young girls. Speaking from experience, I was a pretty hardcore Directioner, at school me and my friends allocated ourselves to each of the boys, I was a Harry girl, and to this day, I still adore Harry Styles. Interestingly, several psychologists have said that these life-long obsessions we have with boy bands are longings for our childhood and upon learning this, I’ve had a bit of an existential crisis surrounding Mr
Styles - Do I really like him and his music or was my 12-year-old self just conditioned to do so? I was listening to Rock Me by One Direction which I now know is about Liam Payne losing his virginity, at quite a young age, which is pretty messed up on both my part and for these types of boy bands too. Fifty years ago, The Beatles also produced extreme reactions from their fans but their music is like none other, it’s spanned across several generations, but boy bands from this century don’t seem to have that same artistry, it seems far more mechanical nowadays.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
