Album Review: Debby Friday- The Starrr Of The Queen Of Life

All the best pop bangers have a yearning undercurrent: think Madonna’s ‘What It Feels Like For A Girl ‘, Robyn’s ‘Dancing On My Own’, St Etienne and ‘He’s On The Phone’. This is also true with R & B- any number of artists, from The Supremes to Solange, mine dark corners of the dancefloor to make their audience feel better. So it is with Debby Friday, the Canadian artist, on her second album. Indeed, her beautiful vocals are pitched halfway between Solange and Shygirl, which seems apposite: she’s evidently pushing modern dance music forward, in spite of one track,’The Club,’ which could sit comfortably in a late nineties playlist. Elsewhere, it’s future pop and soul, all the way down.

Drawing inspiration from stargazing, Friday’s melancholy cannot help but cut through even the most insouciant sounding club tracks. ‘Higher ‘ may blend Latin with drum ‘n’ bass, but it all seeps out. Likewise, ‘Darker The Better’, which is like the long lost cousin of Santogold’s sweet, fragile ‘Lights Out’ with its driving layers of guitar and bass groove.’Lipsync’ though, is sheer, strutting sass, demanding of your attention.

‘Alberta’ meanwhile, strips things right back altogether and leans into true introspection. Friday may be in the lineage of experimental soultronica, but what she does feels at once powerful and effortless. She’ll slap you, and then soothe you in equal measure. Props too for the gorgeous cover, where she poses like a statue of a goddess. One day…one day.

Out via Sub Pop on August 1st.

http://www.debbyfriday.bandcamp.com