Beabadoobee – Fake It Flowers

Beabadoobee’s debut album Fake It Flowers is filled with tunes that recall careless past mistakes – aptly enough for the 20-year-old, fresh out of her teens, who still has a firm grasp of those experiences, the lessons she learned, and the consequences that came with them. The record runs the gamut of teen emotions, from extremes of anxiety and loneliness to the conflict and anger she experienced.

She opens with Care. The track is reminiscent of 1990s and early 2000s film soundtrack and alternative rock like Avril Lavigne and Michelle Branch, mixing typical indie characteristics from music like The 1975 and Pale Waves. There are also traces of early 2000s OPM (Original Filipino Music) that echo throughout the production and composition. Worth It follows with rhythmic guitar and a lazy vocal drawl, relating teenage infidelity and superficial attraction in the verses, which contrast with the heavy crash of instruments in the chorus. The effect reflects a desperate struggle to keep up with the dissonance between her desires and notions of morality in love and relationships.

Soft and wandering, Emo Song has that same slow vocal, this time in a lulling ballad and amplifying the melancholy of the lyrics. The rise in the cutting shred of electric guitar between the chorus and the next verse drives listeners to the edge before it descends, as if finding it all not worth it. Horen Sarrison is a little safer and more comforting than most of the other tracks; vocals and lyrics come to the fore with honest storytelling centered around the realisation, rather than exploration, of conflicting feelings.

Seemingly uncut, How Was Your Day is a stripped-back acoustic track with live-sounding delivery. It is vulnerable and enticing, and personifies the simplicity and nuance of the title. Beabadoobee told Louder Sound that she wanted to include all her “vocal wobbles” and “little mistakes” in the track, and the decision mirrors the nervous, awkward energy in the lyrics. Yoshimi, Forest, Magdalene is an energetic conclusion. She takes the rougher parts of Fake it Flowers and owns them, distorts them, and ushers her music toward both the soft and edgier sides of the alternative rock genre.

Mae Trumata

Fake It Flowers is released on 16^th October 2020. For further information or to order the album visit Beabadoobee’s website here.

Watch the video for the single Care here: