While my current musical tastes are widely varied, I consistently find myself drifting back into the synthpop lane. When it comes to pop music, I tend to gravitate towards an interesting production, honest song lyrics and of course, brilliant vocals. While Vanessa Carlton‘s new EP, Blue Pool (out now via Dine Alone Records) isn’t synthpop per say, it’s her most “electronic” sounding music to-date and that’s exciting to me. My tastes have certainly changed over the years, but there are certain artists that I will always come back to—Vanessa Carlton being one.
Back in May 2012 I wrote a post, citing an (since removed) article in a student-run newspaper which claimed Vanessa Carlton was making an “electronic dance pop record.” Of course I knew, deep down that “electronic dance pop” for Carlton PROBABLY wasn’t what you and I think of as “electronic dance pop.” That would be quite the genre jump! In 2013 Carlton Tweeted about new song that was featured in the background of a video, to which I asked her if it was from her reportedly “electronically-influnenced” album we had learned about the year before. She responded;
@Fool_4_Music hey! euphoria isn’t the name of the album. It’s not straight forward electronica. The palette is its own custom thing x
— Vanessa Carlton (@VanessaCarlton) March 8, 2013
Confirmed. “Not straight forward electronica.” No biggie. Well, upon listening to the first track off her new Blue Pool EP, it sounds like we might finally be getting a taste of Vanessa Carlton‘s version of “electronic dance pop” and if I’m honest, it’s more than I could have ever hoped for. Listen to “Take It Easy” below.
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While it’s not dance pop by any STRETCH of the imagination, “Take It Easy” is easily Carlton’s most “dancey” track to date, but dancey in a CLASSY way. (Classy dancey?) The song starts out with some subtle yet beautiful synth action, before, what sounds like the gentle clamoring of symbols and some distant trumpet (since denied). Vanessa’s vocals sparkle over Steve Osborne‘s elegant and haunting production. The song feels VERY much like a Vanessa Carlton song—only elevated. For the Vanessa Carlton traditionalists out there, don’t you worry. There’s plenty of Vanessa’s signature piano-driven pop sound to be heard on the EP, in reality “Take It Easy” is the most “up-tempo” of the four songs. The EP also includes the title track, “Blue Pool” and two “Live Living Room Session” recordings. Check out the recently released video for “Blue Pool,” which premiered earlier this week on Southern Living.
Check out the Blue Pool EP now (iTunes / Spotify) and be on the lookout for her forthcoming fifth studio album, Liberman, due in October (Dine Alone Records).
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