Gia Ransome – Belladonna
Love’s a terrible thing and for most people unavoidable. It will creep out from behind and leave folks with nothing to their name, not even their dignity. It will make them swear off love forever, only to eventually be proven incapable of resisting it once more.
Experts will come in trying to assess the situation, hoping to stop others from falling just as hard. No sketch artist, however, will be able to show what others ought to look out for. No detective will be able to piece together the motives.
Just like Gia Ransome’s music, this entire force is one that is mysterious and unpredictable. It sends people to their graves just as much as any serious disease, and most of them go down smiling.
“Belladonna” by Gia Ransome is meant to be a siren’s song. This is music designed to get your attention and hypnotise you. What’s the follow-up? Nobody knows if the siren merely wants people to hear her otherworldly voice, or to crash the ships into the jagged rocks.
Ransome leans forcefully into the gifts of her voice, and while there’s an element of over-the-top confidence at times, it’s exciting to hear a singer give herself entirely to the task.
Blankslate – Idaho
If you start trying to break into remote mountain cabins, chances are that you’ll run into your favourite rock musician or writer. Or, if not, there’s a good chance that you’ll have a conversation with someone hoping to come up with a great song or novel idea while contemplating the majesty of nature.
Don’t worry about bothering them. They’re bound to be in there for a while, and they’re hardly as busy as they make themselves out to be. Everyone wants time and space to create. Most people end up watching Netflix.
That makes groups like Blankslate and artists like them all the more special. Artists who manage to do the uncomfortable work of adding to their creative vocabulary in small pieces every day have the potential to do amazing things.
“Idaho” by Blankslate isn’t just a hooky pop song that cleverly blends musical styles together. It’s music that sounds as if it was painstakingly created up in some mountain cabin. It feels as if the songwriters added one small piece every day until they’d not only created something out of nothing, but had changed themselves in the process as well. Ain’t that an artist’s dream?
