With her debut full-length album, Wake UP!, Hazel English has traded the hazy, reverb drenched production styles prevalent in her earlier work for sounds synonymous with classic pop records from the late 60’s. Production isn’t the only dramatic change, however. A move from San Francisco to Los Angeles to explore a collaborative relationship with producer Justin Raisen (Sky Ferreira, Charli XCX, Angel Olsen) proved to bring a fine tuned sense of pop craftsmanship to the songs that would become Wake UP!
On tracks like Shaking, Off My Mind, and Five and Dime, English’s sharpened sense for song writing are on full display with timeless pop hooks and addictive melodies. Wake UP! casts a wry, appraising eye over modern life and promises to be one of the highlights of 2020.
Straw-man time: If it’s hard to make a truly bad dream-pop album, it’s equally tricky to make a really good one, and for identical reasons. The essential ingredients are the same in either case. You need reverb, introspection and hazy melodies that evoke ’60s pop. How you fit them together is what makes all the difference. Australian-born Los Angeles transplant Hazel English puts those elements to use in service of 10 songs that glide by comfortably on her full-length debut, Wake Up!. It’s a respectable enough effort, full of chiming guitars and sleek vocals as English delivers lyrics that parse feelings of isolation and explore power dynamics from romantic relationships to capitalism. Despite the sometimes fraught subject matter, her songs are engaging and pleasant, as well as a reminder to be present and engaged with herself and the world around her.
They also feel more fussed-over than the EPs she released in 2016 and 2017, which had an immediacy these songs sometimes lack. After demonstrating intimacy and charm on her earlier material, English shows with Wake Up! that she’s capable of making a bright, big-sounding album. Once she gets around to combining those sensibilities, well, look out.
The Fat Angel Sings 