Album Reviews

Album Reviews: Ladyhawke by Ladyhawke

Ladyhawke's pedestrian dance music makes it really difficult to focus on the fact that there are some really interesting things happening lyrically on her full-length, self-titled debut. "Manipulating Woman" begins, "Better not try to get inside my head / you'll find a nightmare waiting." Okay, okay, maybe not a revolutionary lyric, but interesting when you consider that singer Phillipa Brown lives with Asperger's Syndrome, related to autism spectrum disorder.

Unfortunately, an interesting back-story can only take you so far–just ask music critics around the world about Chinese Democracy. Once the listener knows about Brown's Asperger's, it's hard not to read every lyric as a reference back to it, but ultimately that doesn't help the album recover from how musically bland it is. Blips and bleeps meander about steady, repetitive drumming, while long drones of synthesizers hide in the background.

Brown’s career is certainly impressive, but this debut doesn't lend the future of Ladyhawke a whole lot of optimism.



—Nathan Atnikov
01.05.08