EMA - Past Life Martyred Saints

the first single seemed to be a natural extension of the sound and attitude of the last album. this one, tho . . .

is an extension of the attitude of her on stage... I remember seeing videos of her live at the Pitchfork festival a few years ago and being really bummed. Realizing then that there's no way I want to ever see her play live.

But I don't hate this song. Kinda indifferent. So far based on this thread I'm not sure if that opinion is allowed!

lol. it's allowed, i'm pretty sure!

i don't like the song, which could put me in a near-exclusive club. who knows?

i swear like two days before this revive i found myself wondering what happened to this terrible artist, guess i know now

The album is half Alternative Nation mixtape (bad) and half spooky PLMS vibes (good). It really sounds like two different artists to me.

I have very much cooled on EMA's older stuff, both PLMS and Red State, after revisiting so I don't have a dog in this fight. I just find the change from "This is great, it sounds like the 90s" to "This is terrible, it sounds like the 90s" kinda perplexing. (I would really like if she sounded like Belly, I absolutely *loved* Belly.) I guess it's more like... use better descriptors, please.

It's in the voice basically. I don't care at all if something sounds like something from the 90s but she has a very generic rock voice and a weakness for melodrama when she lets rip whereas in the more restrained, hypnotic songs I think she sounds fantastic. Any less derivative? Probably not, but I far prefer it.

Is this gonna be her Celebrity Skin?

It's gonna be her 'New Jersey'...

i was alone in the citaaay

Only one listen in, but aside from "So Blonde," where are the songs?!

This album makes me sad. I almost want to take back my support of Martyrs.

It is *because* of Martyrs that this album (so far) makes me sad.

I think I'm in love with her and all that I think she stands for. She just seems happy and so well adjusted and free and a real lover. She seems way more of a lover than a critic.
I like to play her music alone and play it loud, maybe with a pint or two. I love how there is a seeming disconnect between the sparse electronics and guitar and the richness of her vocals. I love the subtle changes within the songs. Some parts are so amazing that you wonder if they were happy accidents instead of immaculately sequenced. Have not been this big of a fan of an artists first two albums since Le Tigre or the White Stripes.

he's SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

blonde

http://25.media.tumblr.com/9cd48e9a89876c2b37488e88bc6bc8a4/tumblr_n1ikrphI9h1todheko1_400.gif

I mean I know this song is not ~typical EMA~ but I have such a soft spot for summertime sunny day shoegaze jams that I just want to listen to it on repeat

guys what if this song is actually better than anything that Lush or Ride did

warm lush overdriven guitars with stoned reverby vocals, suneshine all around, crack open a beer and chill by the pool

song owns video owns vibe owns

this is one of those songs that like seems like it sounds like a million other songs but when I actually stop and try to think of other songs that sound like this w/ this vibe i just draw a blank

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfkKIH6ggcA

2 yrs later and still blasting "So Blonde" for zenith summertime vibes

New album, Exile in the Outer Ring, out August 25!

the new song is good!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7epnE7mxPM

I know nothing
Lasts forever
If you don’t love me, someone will

8-)

Love this new song!

I've not really followed her career deeply so I don't know if this is as strong or not compared to previous stuff but this new album is A+

Haven't heard the new one but Past Life Martyred Saints is still amazing 6 years later.

Goes for like $6-7 on discogs these days... what's the deal? Not that it's super indicative of anything except supply > demand but still... did it not age well for most people?

This reminds me that I once opened for her and Downtown Boys and she (and they) were extremely nice & cool

I see her albums pretty cheap in used bins a lot as well. but in general music by non cis male solo artists tends to have diminished resale value (with some exceptions of course)

I'm sure her somewhat avant leanings aren't much help either

i still give past life martyred saints a spin every now and then -- it holds up well, though California doesn't feel like as much of a standout single as it once did (for context, it came in at #3 on p4k's eoy singles list). I don't think i've played anything from the second album since the year it came out

perhaps "suffered" a bit from overexposure, always seemed kind of niche to me in its aesthetic

it's also quite dark so for me personally it's not something I listen to that much

I was very impressed with the theme of the last record. really enjoyed the interviews about the kinds of ideological conversations she would get into and how the best shows were always at the boundaries between the cities and the suburbs, she had her finger on something being able to address those issues without falling into easy condemnations, while at the same time not letting the evil off the hook. what she does isn't always a kind of pop music I intuitively get, but y'know local bay area family means I root for and I thought that last one was going to be her biggest

I hope she doubles down and goes further into it now that 2020's made all those issues even less ignorable

i know i gave the full album a spin at least once but i don't recall much about it. should try it again. "california" was/is tremendous

I listened to this again a few months back, and its still a very impressive record in the way that Fetch the Bolt Cutters is a very impressive record, though my enthusiasm may have dimmed a tiny bit.

PLMS takes me back to an alternate reality, somewhere in 1997, where this album sits comfortably next to Sonic Youth's Washing Machine and Cat Power's What Would the Community Think.

I think the description upthread of how she evokes both the best and the worst of the alternative 90's is otm. Her songwriting - like most of the songwriting of 90's alternative - leaves a lot to be desired, but she's great at evoking a past life. Problem for me with the follow-up albums to PLMS is that the clearer the production, the less evocative of nostalgia her songs get and her sound is all about nostalgia.