First things first: don’t let anybody tell you there’s no such thing as good pop music these days, that it is a homogenized mess of the same tropes and beats. To a degree, that is true, but trends make money and it’s easier to make cookie-cutter pop to hock to the masses that don’t necessarily have an appetite for a lot of music. It is with artists such as Christine and the Queens, Haim and Jessie Ware that the new frontier of pop can be seen.
For an artist such as Welsh-songstress MARINA (FKA Marina and the Diamonds, AKA Marina Diamandis), someone who has achieved number one albums and a dedicated fanbase, you would think she would be at the front leading the charge with her contemporaries. Staying on the peripherals of mainstream pop, changing, and morphing the aesthetics and narrative of her image with each album, MARINA has always stayed true to her vision rather than conform to what is to be expected of a young woman in the music industry.
With her 2010 debut The Family Jewels, a semi-autobiographical, unabashed statement of a new presence on British Pop, Diamandis continued to craft a new persona with each album since. Coating her raw emotions and critique of the world in a delicious package of quirky and catchy tracks on 2012’s Electra Heart, and on the playful Froot from 2015, Diamandis has possessed this Kate Bush-esque metamorphosis by rewriting her image and sonic pallet with each release without compromising what she believes in.
The new album Ancient Dreams In A Modern Land is another new era for MARINA, doubling down on the empowering and self-assured attitude that is a constant through her previous work (just check out “Hollywood” from her debut if you don’t believe me.) This time incorporating politically and socially conscious lyrics into her signature glittery-pop bangers, the album kicks off with the title track. A galloping disco strut draws you in immediately, with the singers undeniably powerful vocals wrapped around guitar hooks and sweeping synths. A track that questions our place on this planet, boiling it down to a personal level by disregarding the need to fit in with expectations:
“You don’t have to be like everybody else, you don’t have to fit into the norm, you are not here to conform.”
A simple but effective message conveyed through the weaving chorus melodies Marina conjures with layers of vocals and harmonies makes it even more powerful in its delivery. Following in a similar fashion, “Venus Fly Trap” and “Purge the Poison” explode with rhythmic bursts of direct and to-the-point Pop. The former poses the question ‘Why be a wallflower / when you could be a Venus fly trap?’, drawing a parallel between this new persona and a valid criticism of the absence of MARINA being accepted in the mainstream. “Purge The Poison” is a bewitching referential track, giving a wee nod to her debut LP and the current pandemic in which this album was birthed. Both tracks are filled with luscious vocal hooks, a signature for Diamandis’ style that will simply never get old. She crafts such intricate and enticing melodies that never fails to worm its way into your brain.
Carving a vivid string of images invoking the most beautiful elements of our natural world, the pointed “Man’s World” is a scathing critique of our treatment of our planet. As the piano leads the song through this emotional idea, Diamandis calls out the myriad of problems that have been created by the greed and hatred of other men. This direct and pointed manner of critique would maybe seem out of place within another genre, however this works well with the simple but massively effective mid-tempo ballad. Taking aim at, yeah you guessed it, America on “New America”, the staccato strings pick up the pace a bit pulling the album out of the tear-jerking “Highly Emotional People”. The jittering drumbeat holds the song in a state of unease, as Diamandis puts the brutal inequalities and double standards of the United States directly in her sights. Who can blame her?
My main gripe with this album however is the amount of slower, ballad songs that fill most of its second half. They are not necessarily bad songs, for instance the diva level “I Love You But I Love Me More” is a searing hot cauldron of self-love over a stomping Streisand-type beat. It is more to do with the sequencing of the tracks, with the singles and more upbeat numbers opening the album. Over a limiting ten tracks as well the album feels uneven, bordering on the dreary ballads of the Big Singers of late (I’m looking at you Capaldi). Nevertheless, Diamandis’ vocals are of their own amongst the others, brimming with her own individual personality with each motif on “Flowers” and the closer “Goodbye”.
Overall, this is still very much MARINA, it is still filled with her personal stamp of sugary, socially-aware electro-pop. Watching her artistry flourish and develop over the years has been one of the most interesting trajectories that has come out of this country. Ancient Dreams In A Modern Land is available now via Atlantic Records, and you can purchase or stream the album here.
7/10