so, what am i thinking about this fka twigs disc?

it picks up a little after the fourth track, which is horrible. the second track is also terrible. if you scratch those two tracks out, what's left is more along the lines of an ep, and i think you should probably look at this that way - it's a relatively interesting ep with some bad pop pushed down into it to move units. this is what happens when you release your music through major record labels, and that's my first reaction - somebody tell her to sign to warp, instead, so she doesn't need to ruin her records with bad singles.

thematically, i was right to be skeptical about the idea of her elevating mary magdalene to an icon of female autonomy. rather, the record broadly promotes a concept of female weakness that is consistent with patriarchal dominance. her female characters are consistently reliant on the men in her life for strength and meaning, and that should actually be seen as kind of a problem from a young person in 2019. i would suspect that fka twigs is actually a christian, and is trying to reclaim mary magdalene from both a submissive female perspective (as patriarchy programs us with) and ultimately a theistic perspective. i don't want to tell people what they should or should not relate to as their life experiences are their own and they will work things out as they will, but i'd be worried if i found my daughter relating to something like this - it would suggest i was losing the fight against the media in trying to instill a sense of autonomy in her.

musically, she doesn't really explore the promise that exists on a few of the tracks to delve into more substantive, serious music, preferring instead to dabble in pop forms. as is the norm in pop music, these melodies and structures are all borrowed from existing tracks. you've heard these songs before.

and, if there was one thing i wanted from a list of best records of the year, it was some songs i hadn't heard before.

the production on the record is often very thick, but the focus here is on writing marketable pop songs rather than on creating abstract art. these are essentially pop songs sprinkled with ideas from classical music as gimmicks, rather than a substantive synthesis of low and high art.

i would advise keeping an eye on her, as she's clearly talented, and she's clearly interested in being creative. but, this is a step towards an end point, rather than an endpoint in itself.