A glimpse at the cover of Alexandra Riorden‘s debut album is enough to give you an idea of what you are getting yourself in for. The crushed red velvet curtain, the spotlit singer looking quietly crestfallen off into the distance while wearing a frilly but sensual attire, and the roses in her arms: this is a Lynchian universe you’re stepping into. Even the album’s title, Angel City Radio, sounds like it’s a short film from the experimental director’s oeuvre. The corridors are dimly lit, the colour palette right out of the White Stripes’ De Stijl era, and the focus is as much on the visuals as it is on the music.
Were money and opportunity not a concern, then Angel City Radio feels like it would be put on stage every night in a run down theatre, bookended perhaps by screenings of Eraserhead and Blue Velvet, and complete with a vintage Cadillac on stage to drive under theatre street lights. The opening track “Animals” leads you into this world with its minor key descending bass riff, horror-esque synths, and Riorden’s misty singing. One expects the song to open up and darkly flourish outwards, but instead it closes in on itself, bolstering the walls it builds. “My hotel is made of steel / And it keeps out all the animals,” she sings in a trance-like state. (That the song was written in response to a home invasion Riorden experienced only adds an unsettling layer to the track.)
Riorden doesn’t always sink inwards though. On “Tenderness” she shouts “Try / A little / Tenderness” half like it’s a sarcastic threat and half like it’s a command; “I’m talking to me,” she adds. It’s an anthem of self-confidence that makes the near-screaming, cabaret-esque climax at the end feel all the more pointed (or inward-pointing even). It’s a track like this where the frustrated, turbulent healing process of grief and trauma feels like a tangible, pointed dagger that is ready to draw blood. “I never like to leave a song in a space of suffering,” Riorden says of her music, but Angel City Radio might have fared better if she approached her songs less with the intent of wrapping things up neatly by the end. More emotional heights like that which bubbles to the surface on “Tenderness” might have been reached if she wasn’t so afraid to leave a song in a suffering state.
That isn’t to say that other songs on the album are lacking entirely. Carrying forward the Lana Del Rey-like swagger from her 2019 Wierdflower EP and encasing it in darker hues, there’s something enchanting about the sway of Riorden’s delivery. The piano-led “Day by Day” has her inflecting and layering lulling, swirling chords like Weyes Blood, and “We Don’t Want The Same Things” is a somewhat misplaced send-off song that that toes the line between Angel Olsen and Sharon Van Etten with jangly guitar chords and warped VHS-like synths. The final track, “Angel City Radio (Outro)”, is a revisit of opening track “Animals” but bathed in strings to the point where the original song dissolves and disappears completely amidst them. It sounds right out of the Portishead playbook, but the track’s 80 second runtime is no less riveting for this fact.
Indeed, Riorden leans heavily on her influences. On her YouTube channel you’ll find low-key and slightly grainy videos of her singing “Glory Box”, “Wicked Game”, and “Skyfall”, and those three songs permeate into her own music here. Bond theme-like electric guitar ripples find their way onto most tracks, while aforementioned “Animals” sounds like Riorden trying her hand at a Beth Gibbons impression. Elsewhere, Bowie’s hits are glaring on the acoustic chords of “Creature Chorus”, while on “Silver Screen” the chord pattern is “Space Oddity” through and through (complete with a chorus that sounds like Radiohead’s “No Surprises” and “Creep” melded together).
Riorden wearing her influences on her lace-gloved sleeve is no bad thing (again just look at the Lynch nods on the album cover), but it does leave the listener wanting for more personable and individual moments. The real Riorden is hiding between the theatrics, and only sometimes does it feel like we get a glimpse of her. The grief that “The Barrier” centres around, for instance, feels lost in lyrics of doing washing in the rain and a tepid drum beat (though the returning Weyes Blood-like swagger once again fits nicely).
But equally that feels like the point of Angel City Radio. It’s something of a performance piece, if not a half-formed concept album; an art exhibition missing a few crucial pieces, or a theatre production that didn’t have enough full rehearsals. There’s a disjointed feeling to the album, and midway through and towards the second half it feels like it loses its way. In the same way “Creature Chorus” glues together chamber pop strings, spacey and bluesy guitar solos, wordless vocal harmonies, and a hiccuping percussive track, the album feels like the pieces of an incomplete puzzle put together incorrectly.
“Everything inspires me… there are so many magical and beautiful things I’m processing lately,” Riorden said in a recent interview, and that rather hits the nail on the head. There’s a lot happening on Angel City Radio, and maybe too much, like she hasn’t fully finished and realised songs but still wants to include them for a personal poignant end. “This is my experimentation and expression,” she adds. In true Lynchian fashion, she succeeds in this regard. The music here is just part of the full picture and part of the journey. Jump in the Cadillac. Angel City Radio is playing over the velvety darkness. Riorden is your driver and she doesn’t know exactly where she’s going. That’s all part of the thrill, I guess.
