Send "Blouse " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 I often return to this line from Simon Reynolds' Retromania: "Unlike digital formats, analogue degrades through overuse: each listener kills the sound she loves." There's a certain comfort in that kind of reciprocity, and anyone who's ever accidentally reset the listening history on their iTunes library and felt like they'd wiped a part of their identity clean is familiar with the digital world's maddening indifference to our affection. With that observation, Reynolds hits on the unifying and fundamentally human allure of chillwave, lo-fi, smear-pop, and any other kind of contemporary music that makes a conscious choice in an Auto-Tuned world to sound less than pristine. It's music trying to approximate the grubby, hopelessly destructive way we love books, records, and each other.Like a pre-owned Delorean or a Berlin cassette slowly decaying in the bargain bin, Portland trio Blouse's self-titled debut comes to us sounding like it's already been colored by somebody else's use. Though it's got an unabashedly Reagan-era sound, it's the record's almost pathological obsession with the past that places it so squarely in the now. Any of its 10 tracks could sit comfortably on pretty much anyone's 2010s playlist: it broods like a lower-fi version of Charli XCX's Cold War-tinged tunes, it beams through cloudy dark like John Maus' murky pop, and it even boasts a song called "Videotapes" on which the synths sound like warping videotapes. And yet, Blouse amounts to something more evocative and suggestive than trendy pastiche. There's one obvious reason: Some of these songs are just really that good. "Into Black" strikes the right balance of lush atmosphere and driving force, while the mid-tempo "Controller" evokes an austere cool. It's album opener "Firestarter", though, that best expresses the young band's manifesto, introducing them as a dream-pop group intent on razing the roof. "Let's forget the ceiling," vocalist Charlie Hilton beckons beguilingly over a wash of twinkling synths, "It's just made of stone."...full text |
| Bowlegsmusic |
| Portland three-piece Blouse have made an alluring debut full of low-down bass, eerie synth work and hushed vocals – perfectly wrapped in electronic dance attitude. It’s not hard to see why Captured Tracks picked up the group after hearing a couple of tunes on Bandcamp – this is right up their industrial-edged, electronic side-street. The voice is that of Charlie Hilton, and her well-spoken and heavenly tones take the record on a ethereal journey, managing to soften even the coldest, and more stripped 80s dance, that the duo occasional drop by. On tracks like healwaysflysaway she comes across like a modern day Nico, undeterred by the rhythmic and funk-edged bass-line and ominous analogues. The drum patterns here set the tone of each track. On the excellent Timetravel they take off on a more upbeat pace – almost fashioning a motorik-like vibe. On Controller the keyboards waver like Joy Division’s Closer, but here they are led by Wilson’s tones, rather than the tortured soul of Ian Curtis. It may be that Hilton’s voice is too chilled to ever create any real intensity, but it successfully aids the record’s engaging ambience. The other members, Patrick Adams and Jacob Portrait, certainly has a knack for varying rhythms and effective keyboard work to back up each track. And with the use of live guitars songs like Ghostdreams take on an old-school Cure vibe....full text |
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