February 14: A musical adventure

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This Valentine’s Day I shall be drawing your attention to three rather unconventional songs.

It’s always worth remembering that not everyone enters into the spirit of February 14, and as such we have Bluebell questioning the fairytale image of love and romance, perpetuated by Disney amongst others, and finding the reality to be rather different.

‘Cinderella’ is one side of a double A side single released last summer, the other track being ‘Normal Heights’. You can read more about Bluebell here. If you haven’t been able to watch the embedded video above, you can watch the video to ‘Cinderella’ here.

There’s also the rather moody ‘Gigantic’ by Eddi Front, in the video to which a distinctly windswept Front ponders the end of the affair in a distinctly bleak monochrome landscape while looking not unlike a pre-Raphaelite Miss Havisham. The message appears to be not so much ‘love hurts’ as ‘Divorce is hugely traumatic’.

Front, like Bluebell’s Annabel Jones, has been making music prior to adopting her current nom de plume. In Front’s case, she has been gradually weaned off Cat Power and Liz Phair inspired lo fi and nudged towards a more polished, finished sound than previous. “It took a long time for me to not hate the sound of perfection,” she recently told Pitchfork. She also admits that it took a long time for her to be persuaded to record in a studio. Her songs are subtle growers, stark, eerie and in the case of ‘Gigantic’, heartbreakingly sad.

And finally, London singer/songwriter Rebekah Delgado opts for a night in alone in ‘Menage á moi’. The video to ‘Menage á moi’ is something of a departure from the angelic tone struck by ‘Sing you through the storm’ but, if anything, ‘Menage á moi’ feels more representative of her work.

We will be hearing more of her…

Image is an outline of a pink heart in spray paint on a black background. Over it and in it are the words ‘Love is boring’, ‘Love is mean’ and ‘Set my heart free’, which are lyrics taken from Bluebell’s song ‘Cinderella’.It was made by me.

Video commentaries:

1st Video: Bluebell, ‘Cinderella’: A pensive and at times distinctly unimpressed Annabel Jones watches and assembles a mash up of clips of weddings, proposals of marriage, hen and stag nights and the works of Walt Disney.

2nd Video: Eddi Front, ‘Gigantic’: A windswept and seemingly fragile Eddi Front moves slowly through a monochrome landscape in a white dress and bolero, with white flowers in her hair. She wipes her eyes gingerly and looks distinctly upset throughout.

3rd Video: Rebekah Delgado, ‘Menage á moi’: A distinctly restless Rebekah Delgado performs ‘Menage á moi’ in her flat. She writhes around on the sofa and broods while gently alluding to female masturbation. Inbetween, she does some polishing outside and eats some chocolate cake. The video ends, as it began, with her open mouthed and mouthing the ‘huh,huh,huh’ staccato intro/conclusion to the song. She then winks.