Fifty Greatest Albums of This Year: No 3 – Blood Orange: An Album of Loss
This year's most profound records are filled with a sense of mourning. Considering the definitive and dismal split with political responsibility, defenses of marginalised people, and the intrusion of machine learning into creative fields, this musical preoccupation is hardly surprising. While artists like one acclaimed artist and another renowned singer sought a higher plane, and acts like a global superstar and KeiyaA delivered songs of defiance, Dev Hynes presents a deeply personal reflection on bereavement.
An Intimate Exploration of Bereavement
Dev Hynes' fifth album as his musical alias seems particularly keyed into the scattered, unfocused headspace that follows the passing of a loved one. Named Essex Honey, its agitated essence is summed up in its aching opening lines. These lyrics might be interpreted as contrasting the dying's peace with the survivor's difficulty to understand it: “With your grace, I sought some meaning,” he sings. “Yet I discovered nothing, and I persist in hunting for a truth.”
“Each track is bathed in a yearning sheen, and progresses the way the mind does.”
Artistic Terrain of Seeking
This search is wide-reaching. The album reimagines a revered post-punk song into a driving hymnal. In other places, sharp post-punk gems are charged with ire. A clearly heartfelt pairing contrasts languid, flute-accented groove. Hynes' focus changes during particular pieces, often to discomfiting impact. Abruptly, a driving rhythm will hurtle in and agitate silky strings.
- One standout track: Features a team-up with a renowned novelist.
- Another key song: Starts with staccato entreaties and stilted ivories before veering off into lush four-on-the-floor rhythm.
- Recurring Motifs: Harsh string themes appear again over the LP, like unexpected shocks back to anguish.
Organic Elegance
If you let it immerse you, the album flows like weather shifting past a pane. Regardless of its stark opposites, it feels gorgeously real. This is achieved not only through real-world wisps of found sound—bird calls, TV samples, family talk—but due to Hynes' elegance as an arranger. Harmonies interestingly sound at once accidental and exquisitely turned.
An Ensemble of Guests
He doesn’t often sing alone. The record's stellar guest list is a proof of a network built up over 20-plus years in music. However these contributors are not employed for mere spectacle; they act more like integral parts in a beautifully comfortable fabric, serving as support and to externalise desolate feelings.
- A recurring voice: Brings an angelic presence with a clear falsetto.
- Another notable appearance: Uses a distinctive grain to portray someone unraveling at the seams.
- A duet dynamic: Sees Hynes' resonant voice mirroring the guest's, like an underworld figure affirming darkest thoughts.
The Ultimate Realization
Essex Honey grapples with a particular outlook: when the most terrible thing has happened, why does anything else hold meaning? The lyricist's suggestive verses constantly revisit the past, grasping to recollections. The artist came close to didn’t release the record, questioning its reason for being. A recognition of good luck—the ability to share art with an listeners—altered its essence. The closing number finishes with a mirror image of the first line, representing a acceptance to the irretrievable. That stunning and instinctive record documents the experience of a life reconfigured, tracing its awful new contours with sensitivity.
