Eliza Rose: the ache under the bubblegum

Eliza Rose made her name in the UK underground as a party starter. ARCADIA:PLEASUREDOME, the initial move in a fresh direction following new management and a new label, maintains the pulse while letting the doubt in. Six tracks, produced by Sega Bodega, out now on Rosebud Recordings.

She emerges from UK club music, a stalwart whose name was built on getting the party going. This EP is what follows the party: hard-won vulnerability, contemporary insecurity, wanting something so much it aches.

Sega Bodega handled production, and his credits serve as the helpful marker. Shygirl, Rosalia, FKA Twigs, Bjork. Here he drives breakbeat toward more emotional ground, dense synths over a base-level maximalism borrowed from 8-bit soundtracks.

Sour Grapes starts it off with the beat dropping in sync with heels on a damp inner-city street, synths rising and fading like passing cars, vocoded las and ohs that sound like sobbing. Rose sings 'I left my heart in the gutter' and drifts into the chorus. The loveliest thing here, and the most anguished.

Undercover Lover is the lead single and the most disorienting. An arpeggiated chord comes in so cheery it reads as a joke, and the track never lets up, shifting through vocal styles and effects. It is inauthentic on purpose: 'Sweeter than candyfloss, just wanna eat ya, let you taste my lipgloss.'

Kite traces its roots to the 90s London jungle that the record repeatedly alludes to, with junglist vocals set against off-kilter percussion and incorporated samples. 'We like a likkle fun, we ain't straight laced' functions as a taunt, not an invitation to party.

Dove comes back to more spacious, interwoven arrangements, less melancholic than the opener, with Rose singing over syncopated beats about craving something so intensely it aches. Final Ride ends the album in less than two minutes: a fast beat, restless arpeggios, and then a spoken question, 'Do you think we can ever outrun the past?'

Those who turn to Burial for sampling and Sega Bodega for production will locate that same gap between beat and emotion in this release, and it works on an overnight bus as effectively as in a club. If you were seeking the party-anthem edition of Rose, this isn’t it. The weakness lies in congestion: Undercover Lover never allows its own effects to settle, and six tracks packed this densely would benefit from more room.

The reply to that final question is the last sound on the record. Keys press, silence, then a raised voice: 'I dunno, but we can try!' A nervous beat and an answer that costs something. Four out of five.

The tracklist

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