“I feel your warmth, but I evade it.”
Following up their genre-bending and experimental sophomore effort, Glitch Princess, yeule takes on a fresh and ambitious sonic direction. While wearing the influence of lush ’90s shoegaze and the timeless sound of 2000s alt-rock on their sleeve, softscars manages to define a distinct, new era for yeule, and constructs a universe in which absolutely everything fills you with unfiltered misery.
yeule said in an interview with Rolling Stone that they enjoy songs that make them “feel nostalgic, but seem almost uncanny,” and that is a concise and apt way to describe that environment they have built for softscars. Transitioning into a new sound, all the while striking a deal with Ninja Tune, it seems that yeule wants to explore this new chapter of their career with an open mind. Unsurprisingly, softscars seems to be a great first step into this uncharted territory.
Opening the LP with “x w x” is a certainly a power-move, which displays the abundance of confidence that yeule has for this new style. Rightfully so, too, as upon my first listen, I was immediately blown away, and had no doubt about this being my favorite endeavor of theirs to date. The presence of the drums on this track is a refreshing take on yeule’s usual production, and the familiarity of their unique voice coincides with the instrumentation. Once they break the pace for the first time with the distant, nerve-wracking screams that occur before the minute mark, I was sure that this would be my favorite. To the album’s detriment and success, this would remain true for the entire record.
Following this cathartic first track is a contrasting slow-bop in lead single “sulky baby”. I believe, especially with the pacing of the project as a whole, that this juxtaposition between the first two tracks works in yeule’s favor. However, I already found myself missing the liveliness they managed to capture so strongly in the opening track. “sulky baby” works as a summary for the entire record, including an earworm of a hook, palpable melancholy, and yeule’s unmistakable voice. The repetitive vocable threaded throughout the track serves as a double-edged sword; catchy, yet quite annoying to my ear. It’s not without its place, but it stands out to a fault for this track and could have been used sparingly, or not at all.
For me, softscars picks back up immediately with the title track. This track enriches the atmosphere of desolation that yeule intended for this record, while maintaining both a prominent beat and elements of their earlier glitch-pop work. The short electronic break included on this single is simultaneously spacey and adorable, with synths that feel like they could’ve been ripped straight from a retro video game. Adding this instrumentation in place of a bridge works wonders for the track as it moves toward the real hook, creating a satisfying release to the song which wasn’t building in a noticeable way previously.
“dazies” opens with one of my favorite riffs on the record; both groovy and bleak. Like the title track, this was a no-brainer to use as a single. “dazies” was the only single I’d heard prior to consuming the record in full, so I wanted to hone in on the lyricism of this project with this song, and yeule doesn’t stray far from the self-deprecating and nihilistic themes of their previous works here. The opening line of this song, “You like rotting on your bed” is a dead-on way to summarize the entire tone of this album. This project just sounds like the universal feeling of staying up until dawn, losing time in a whirling haze of negativity and insecurity, and yeule is completely aware of that.
They follow this up with an entire verse dedicated to the isolation and agony of depression, and specifically an eating disorder, a topic yeule has yet to shy away from. On previous songs such as “Friendly Machine” and “Don’t Be So Hard on Your Own Beauty”, yeule sings candidly about these issues; “Flush my vomit down the drain / Think of my body getting hit by a train”. It’s this brutal honesty that solidifies the identity of yeule as an artist, not a genre that others look to box them in.
However, despite so many strong cuts thus far, while I don’t think the latter half of this album is bad by any means, I do feel a certain lull that runs from the cover of “fish in the pool” until “bloodbunny”. They work well in adding to how cohesive this project is, and contain some of my favorite lyrical additions for this album, but I could feel myself, once again, itching for something adjacent to the energy of the record’s opener.
That is until one of my favorites of the record, late-album highlight “cyber meat vampy”, a track that confidently flaunts the post-punk influence that yeule had also mentioned in their aforementioned interview with Rolling Stone. The dancey beat, combined with the song’s prominent bass line feels reminiscent to that classic Joy Division or The Cure sound, proving to be something I desire more of from yeule. The track develops into the aforementioned 2000’s alt-rock with a purgative – and very yeule – instrumental break. yeule candidly explores their gender, expression, and even the disconnection they feel with personification. Lyrics like, “There’s a boy and girl inside me too / Non-binary it’s true / Electric bones, electric heat / Android blood tastes, oh, so sweet / I love to play, play, play pretend / Human body, human flesh” illustrate their non-binary identity and describe the discomfort that comes with feeling detached from yourself.
yeule closes this chapter in their catalog with “aphex twin flame”, clearly an homage to the legendary 90’s electronic artist, Aphex Twin. With an album that wears its influences without shame, it only feels right to have a song titled this way. This track, while decidedly not my favorite, serves as a satisfactory closer. Through this primarily acoustic track, yeule engages with some of their most emotionally charged vocals on the record and encases this tenacious album in a way that remains despondent, but provides a sense of closure.
I can’t say for sure whether or not this is my favorite work from yeule. There are parts I love, and others that I felt were largely unnecessary, but there is nothing here that takes away from the intentions of this record. I was certainly left yearning for yeule to delve deeper into this infatuation they have for shoegazey alt-rock, as I believe it suits their voice and that it would certainly bode well with their intended audience. However, softscars, although not a perfect record, world-builds in a way that is impressive and immersive, and that is a talent yeule has nearly perfected. yeule’s work has some room for improvement, but I’m sure with their undeniable artistic vision, their next project has the potential and necessary components to blow me away.
7/10
softscars is due for release this Friday, September 22nd via Ninja Tune, and you can find pre-orders for the record here.