For the past two days I’ve been listening to ‘CexCells’ by Blaqk Audio to the exclusion of all others. I really have to be in the mood for electronic music, and I guess I’ve been in the proper mood. I bought the album when it first came out but didn’t really listen to it. Then I listened to bits and pieces and I’ve finally broke down and listened to the whole thing front to back. AMAZING.
It’s been really soothing these past few days when I’ve been ever so close to either a nervous breakdown or a castrating rampage. That’s right, I said castrating. Stupid Boy. Anyway, it’s also making me want to get up and dance, and nothing makes me want to get up and dance. Seriously. It’s also great music to design along with. It makes the inanity easier to swallow.
Musically, it’s great. The beats are so much fun and Davey’s really doing some creative things with his singing. I was unaware he could croon. I love it. There are some pared down slow burners mixed in with some decadent flourishes. Like I said, LOVE.
To prove my devotion, here’s a song by song breakdown:
‘Stiff Kittens’: The visual image I get from this is different step teams on roller skates just straight up breaking it down. Is that weird? Lyrically, my favorite part is, ‘If you show me heaven, I will meet you there.’
‘Between Breaths (An XX Perspective)’: There is sooooo much to love about this one. Davey singing about naughty things? Yes, please, keep going. The beats of the song are so slinky and sexy. It’s not stripper music; it’s fuck music. ‘Please Please Please, don’t take it, take it easy on me, just make it, make it, make it harder to breathe, so I climb on top and I’ll never stop til I make you forget who you are.’ Um yeah, what he said. Sweet Jesus.
‘Snuff on Digital’: The beat of this song makes me want to dance, run, fuck or some combination thereof. The chorus is one of those aforementioned flourishes that erases everything from your brain and leaves behind only the urge to move. ‘Immobile lights will fly tonight, We’ll watch them pass together as we part the rising sky, I won’t die without you, These breathtaking heights lend sparkling sights, But we won’t fall forever, Tightly bound we’ll chase the ground, I won’t die without you.’ That makes me happy.
‘Bitter for Sweet’: This is a little more industrial sounding. Lyrically it’s also a bit darker. Example: ‘How deep must we cut, to reach sensation.’ Of course, I’m not the Daily Mail so I know that dark lyrics do not a suicide death cult make. The last quarter of this song is the cherry on the cake. I love those really fast, up-tempo hooks. I think I might have been a raver in a past life.
‘Where Would You Like Them Left?’: I consider this one a slow burner. It’s not really danceable; it’s more sit back and chill. May favorite line ‘It’s a lot to take, but they won’t find us, it’s a lot to take I know, I know, it’s a lot to face, but pay no mind, cause this is how we’re made you know, and so’ mainly because he sings it in this sexy little whisper that is almost unbearable.
‘The Fear of Being Found’: This is a dreamy little pop song. I love it. Those flourishes I mentioned? Full of them. It’s so very soothing. ‘Could I change one thing?, Could I change your mind?, Shall we burn it just like the last time?, I can’t change a thing, can’t explain why I never felt it, Not even the first time,’ feels oddly relevant to me, even though I don’t like The Boy muddling with my Blaqk Audio listening experience.
‘On a Friday’: I design like a motherfucker to this song. Seriously, when I need to kick ass and take names and get a shit ton of pages out in record time, this is the jam. If I weren’t usually at work, I’d totally be dancing along with this. Oh, and because Davey’s apparently in my head and knows my shit before I do, there’s this little gem of a lyric: ‘Did he want you? Did you want to? Did you question what it meant to you, With a beat between your breaths?’ And at about the 3 minute mark, it takes all my willpower not to burst out into song and dance. That’d be embarrassing.
‘The Love Letter’: This mixes industrial and dreamy and it is a beautiful thing. Favorite line? ‘Walk right through me, I’m not really there.’ This is also fuck music. ‘What I’ll never show, what you’ll never find, is explosive, so hide your eyes.’ Again, Davey, get outta my head, sir!
‘Semiotic Love’: To quote Sprockets: ‘Now is the time on Sprockets vhen ve dance!’ Again, had I not been at work, I would have burst into a horrible techno dance. ‘I’ll stand forever, and love whatever, breaks my heart’ and ‘Just say goodbye, I live and I’ll die, hooked on a star, enraptured by the sky, in love with a satellite’ make me unbearably happy.
‘Cities of Night’: I love the beat to this. It’s another kinda chill one and works as a great follow up to ‘Semiotic Love.’ This also provides my new favorite lyric: ‘Will you live in hope, or dark desire, what can I say, oh, fuck love give me fire.’ Preach, good sir — PREACH! Because I’m a newspaper nerd ‘We’ll shine this time, we’ll make headlines’ makes me smile.
‘Again, Again and Again’: I fucking love this. The beat is awesome. It’s that fast-paced, thumping rhythm that doesn’t let up. Fabulous. Oh and the chorus: ‘What’ll it take for you to surrender, I gave you a taste oh how you’ve grown, this great trial, this self denial, it’s a trial to leave you clean, because I like it dark and low, you know’ LOVE. Oh, and they were smart enough to leave that last serial comma off. YAY!
‘Wake Up, Open the Door and Escape to the Sea’: This is just beautiful. Try to listen to this and not want to grab a sweetheart and cuddle like a mother fucker. ‘But, oh, My, my, you’re oh so sly, Let’s leave unsaid, What’s left unspoken, And oh, my boy, You’re oh so coy, Let’s just pretend, That nothing’s broken.’ All right Davey, I give up. You’re obviously reading my thoughts, setting them to a techno beat and making me fucking like it. You win.
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