I began this review after stumbling onto the “That Iron Taste” EP a while back, and making a special note to set aside some time. I was waiting for the EP to download when I came across a couple of new videos on her YouTube channel and found out that yesterday she released a new EP.
Christmas came early this year.
Marika Hackman’s story is exactly like many we have heard before: Burberry model turned folk-pop singer, all before turning 21 (If I had a nickel for every time I heard that…). But don’t be fooled. She has said in interviews “I guess there is quite a dark said to me”. That’s a bit like James Franco saying “I’m a little different”.
I was instantly bewitched when I took in her music video to “Bath is Black” off of the “That Iron Taste” EP.
The lyrics of the song talk of regret, and the video shows just as much thought and depth. It is a beautiful contrast to the “perfect love” of pop music; an ode to what happens when love isn’t beautiful. When watching Bath is Black and her other videos, you get the impression that they are much like her songs; not put together, but built upon. She says her writing style simply involves sitting down with a guitar for hours, playing around until something works, and you can see that throughout her EPs. The reason everything molds together is because she took the time to build from an idea, instead of simply adding to it.
“Folk Pop” is an inadequate description of her music, especially when you consider her latest release, the “Sugar Blind” EP. Her first EP ran the gamut of sounds and song structures. From thealmost a cappella Retina Television and Plans, to the eclectic blend of natural and electronic sounds on I’ll Borrow Time, Marika seemed to be experimenting, intentionally searching. On the Sugar Blind EP, she is beginning to find her bearings.
The EP opens with Cinnamon, a fitting introduction and summation of the EP, featuring her signature, raw vocals, provocative lyrics and sparse, but effective percussion. Her melodies often refuse to resolve the way we have learned to expect, but morph to keep up with chord progressions that go far beyond “fill-in-the-blank” radio pop and rock.
Marika lists Sylvia Plath among her influences, and the darkness she is drawn to plays out in her music. The second track, Itchy Teeth, opens with imagery too vivid to passively ingest.
I’ve been left to lick my wounds for so long. I’m down to bone. Callous tongue, itchy teeth, metal mouth with rubber gums. I can’t talk now. Hold me for an hour, flowers bloom in less.
The instrumentation is sparse, with her vocals hovering like a fog over a sea of strings and undulating guitars.
She follows that with Wolf, a song with the kind of light, erratic, syncopated melody that feels like it was stolen from a preset recording of a toy piano. The track is filled out with what almost sounds like a chopped up sample of an older artist who sounds like her. You could almost mistake it for the stuttering synth that sputters in the background.
The EP closes with 81, a song which sounds like an old 60s recording that Quentin Tarantino almost chose for Kill Bill instead of Nina Simone’s “Bang Bang”
The only complaint I could possibly have is that the EP was finished far too quickly.
Website: http://www.marikahackman.com/
Twitter:@MarikaHackman
Sounclound: https://soundcloud.com/marika-hackman
