Fake It Flowers. beabadoobee

Moving from a serious alternative rocker to a dreamy adolescent is a piece of cake for beabadoobee or singer-singwriter Beatrice Laus from London, with roots in the Philippines. It has already been mentioned often how the only 20 years old singer moves into 90s alternative music. For me that is only half of the story.

Yes, I can point to how the influence of the ballad side of Smashing Pumpkins can be heard in a song like 'Horen Sarrison'. '1979' isn't far away here and give me beabadoobee's voice in a song like this any time. That isn't explanation enough in my ears. 'Horen Sarrison' shows a totally different side to this artist, where even Massive Attack can be pointed to in the singing. It shows the musical richness of Fake It Flowers.

I have come to understand that beabadoobee is presented as one of the saviours of alternative rock or at least one of the major talents in that segment of (rock) music. That is a step too far. Perhaps some of the bands dwelling in this country have not been noticed yet, Global Charming, to mention just one. Again, Fake It Flowers is too varied to be pushed into alternative rock. The record holds ballads, singer-songwriter songs as well. In other words this is a singer presenting herself to the world in a few guises, showing that in the future she can tread into many directions. Even a 90s lo-fi singer-songwriter ('How Was Your Day?'), something that ironically is a niche in music that has become redundant. Everyone who saves a few hundred dollars can buy professional digital equipment and record hi-fi.

Press Shot: Callum Harrison

The album opens in the way I had expected reading on beabadoobee before having heard a note. 'Care' and 'Worth It' sucked me into the album straight away. Yes, part sentiment for the music that were part of my personal third musical wave, one that sort of continues to this day with an album like Fake It Flowers. The charm of 'Care' is that it contains the art of not overdoing things. There's not a grungy Seattle guitar within earshot. Above the solid drumming are instruments with light touches and a girl singing like a girl over it all and not like a angry, drunken fish wife (Courtney had her charms for sure). When the pedal is pushed towards or even into the red, yes, it happens as well on this album, then it is still the girl singing. The result are songs that have lightness within them, coming close to Veruca Salt's 'Eight Arms To Hold You'. Songs that hold a nice element of pop within them, without shielding it, like Nirvana was a master at.

It is when beabadoobee takes a turn towards other kind of songs Fake It Flowers starts to give away some of its surprises, as I did not see that turn coming when starting to the album for the first time and to be honest, they still surprise me every once in a while. Often an artist gets slammed for having two such different faces, here it adds to the charm of Fake It Flowers.

So, Fake It Flowers may not be the saviour of alternative rock, for more than one reason, it is an album by a young artist that shows a lot of potential. beabadoobee may be able to surprise the world some more in the years to come, as she doesn't let herself be caught in one corner.

Wo.

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