TRACK REVIEW: beabadoobee - Together

TRACK REVIEW:

beabadoobee

PHOTO CREDIT: blackksocks

Together

9.6/10

The track, Together, is available from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngDzKqMv5yM

The album, Fake It Flowers, is available to order via:

https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/beabadoobee/fake-it-flowers/lp-plus

RELEASE DATE:

16th October, 2020

GENRE:

Indie Rock

ORIGIN:

London, U.K./Iloilo City, Philippines

LABEL:

Dirty Hit

TRACKLISTING:

Care

Worth It

Dye It Red

Back to Mars

Charlie Brown

Emo Song

Sorry

Further Away

Horen Sarrison

How Was Your Day

Together

Yoshimi, Forest, Magdalene

__________

MOST artists I review…

PHOTO CREDIT: blackksocks for Rolling Stone

were alive during the 1990s, but that is not the case with beabadoobee. She seems so suited to the music of the time and such a fan, yet she was not alive during that decade. It makes it all the more remarkable that she channels some of the 1990s’ sounds into her own as though she experienced it first time around. I will come onto that later but, with her debut album, Fake It Flowers, out and getting so much love, I was eager to review a track from it. There has been a lot of attention around beabadoobee, and she is an artist who has made a big mark in such a short time. At just twenty years old, she is establishing herself as one of the most remarkable and popular young artists in the U.K., and there is something about her music that is simply engrossing and spellbinding. She would have had big plans for this year, as the momentum she gained last year – with the release of her E.P., Space Cadet – primed her for a very busy schedule in 2020. Instead, things are very different, but that does not mean that beabadoobee has been quiet! I just want to briefly quote from an interview in The Standard pre-pandemic, that gives a brief bit of biography and also shows just how much she has achieved in such a short time:

“Beatrice Kristi Laus settles into the corner booth of a Wandsworth cafe at 2pm and orders mozzarella sticks, which are breakfast. The 19-year-old is winging it again and why not? From her cutesy, hastily chosen stage name Beabadoobee — a scatting play on her first name Beatrice — to her lower-than-lo-fi debut recording Coffee, which earned her a record deal after she put it online for fun in 2017, she’s made a virtue of avoiding pre-planning.

Things she has made to look effortless in 2020 include: being tipped on all the lists — she’s been named a Brits Rising Star, a YouTube One to Watch and a BBC Sound of 2020 in recent weeks, racking up Instagram followers to the tune of almost 375,000 and becoming an arena act. She’s about to support The 1975 around the UK, including two nights at the O2 next month. She only finished school last summer, with terrible A-level results”.

Before I get to the present and look at her music now, I want to head back to beabadoobee’s childhood and upbringing; put in interview snippets where she talks about that period and what it was like – so one can get a better overview and impression of the songwriter. I think her school life and those years were not the smoothest and happiest, and it is almost like beabadoobee was born in the wrong time. Inspired and made happy by music from the 1990s, I think there was a determination to get into music and taker a different course. Not to suggest that school was unhappy purely because of her music desires, as it is quite a complex issue, but it is obvious that beabadoobee (Beatrice Lau) had other ambitions and important things in her life. When she spoke with The Forty Five this year, we get a sense of what beabadoobee’s school years were like:

“At the risk of psychologising, her desire to cocoon herself in the familiar sonics of young childhood feels logical when you consider Bea’s rocky adolescence. Raised in West London, school was far from ideal, and she hints at other struggles too, a ‘dark period’ that seems to link back to a feeling of placelessness, her Filipino heritage rendering her as something of an outsider in a classroom full of insecure teens looking for an easy target. Soon, she had fallen in with the ‘stoner crowd’, and just before starting her A-Levels, her teachers called time on her erratic attendance and attitude – she was asked to find a new school. Not the easiest conversation to have with your parents…

“Well, honestly, at first, I feel like any parent would be like, “er, what the fuck?” she remembers. “I wasn’t taking education seriously. I only got into music quite late in my life, and when my dad bought me a guitar at 17, it meant a lot that he understood that I needed something to distract myself from being so sad. He and my mum saw how hard it was growing up in a predominantly white, all-girls Catholic school – you know those backhanded compliments and snidey little remarks? Girls can be amazing, but for some reason, secondary school is just a shithole.”

PHOTO CREDIT: blackksocks

Signing a record deal at 17 could have induced its own regrets, but she remains happy on Dirty Hit, finding it difficult to imagine herself anywhere else. Her comfort is emphasised by the location from which she talks – a residence out in the Oxfordshire sticks, where she’s currently working on an unspecified recording project with The 1975, to be released at some point after she’s had time to “properly live in the ‘Fake It Flowers’ universe”.

It would have been hard assimilating and feeling seen in a school where there were a lot of white faces, and it was surely a strange and lonely time for her. That struggle to feel accepted can be heard in her music but, from an outsider’s viewpoint, one can understand why music would have been a more appealing and sensible route than further education or a more conventional path, as it seems like beabadoobee gained more knowledge and joy from listening to music than being around school and her peers. In that interview with The Standard, she talks more about the alienation and oddness of school:

“It sounds as though she’s had some difficult teenage years to work through before gaining the confidence to be centre stage. “School was predominantly white, rich girls. It was very hard to fit in. I struggled a lot with self-acceptance, what I wore, how I did my make-up. The popular girls wouldn’t bully you so obviously but bring you down in a way that hurt just as bad. No boys really liked me. I was an anomaly. But I had to go through all of that, and feel shit, to be in the mental state I’m in right now. It really shaped me as a person”

I am going to move onto a different subject in a second but, if school seemed like a struggle and a place where beabadoobee did not fit in, then it appears that her parents offered her more support and solidity. The family moved to the U.K. from The Philippines, and whilst it must have been scary going to such a different country, it seemed like there was more opportunity here. Even though American and British bands of the 1990s soon came into her orbit, there was a lot of different sounds filling the home. In this interview from DAZED, beabadoobee discusses the pride she has in her parents and the pride that they have in her:

“Bea overflows with adoration when she talks about her mum and dad, saying that they moved to the UK “for me – that’s why I want to do everything for them. Even though I can be a cunt sometimes.” She was born in Iloilo City in the Philippines in 2000, where she says her parents were well off, her dad working as a representative for a pharmaceutical company. “They wanted a better education for me,” explains Bea. “My dad had a super intense life as a kid. He was in the slums, shining shoes and shit. So it was his life goal to not make me go through any of that.” When Bea was two, her mum, a nurse, moved to London; a year later, Bea and her dad followed. Her dad then trained as a nurse too, and Bea's 11-year-old brother (who has ASD, and who she describes as “fucking amazing”), was born a few years later.

Bea’s parents spent her childhood filling the house with OPM (Original Pilipino Music), including bands like Itchyworms and APO Hiking Society, as well as the Smiths, the Cranberries, and Sonic Youth. They’re more stoked than anyone that their daughter is playing the O2 tonight (“I’m pretty sure my mum low-key always wanted to be in a band,” says Bea). But a few years ago, it wasn’t their plan for her to skip university to pursue music. They enrolled her in a prestigious all-girls’ Catholic grammar school in west London. Bea hated it. “The teachers were really mean, the girls were really mean,” she remembers. “There was not a lot of Asian girls in my school, they were predominantly white and rich – and I was not” – she lets out that bright, boisterous laugh – “I was a migrant!”

PHOTO CREDIT: Sarah Louise Bennett

I am going to spend some time in the 1990s as, when you look at the reviews for Fake It Flowers, many have noted that the decade can be heard in the bones and blood of the music. The 1990s was very important to me, and I really love the music of the time. It is a decade so full of variety and life, and I can understand why songwriter now are so enamoured of the 1990s. In this interview with The Guardian, there is a bit more exposure regarding her school experiences, but also why she was drawn to Alt-Rock of the ‘90s:

“It is a sound that suited her character better: at least one thing that seems to draw her to early 90s alt-rock is its preponderance of tough, expectation-defying female role models, from Courtney Love to Bikini Kill to Kim Deal. “People were expecting me to be super-cute and quiet or whatever, and then they realised I had a big, fat mouth and went to an all-girls school that kicked me out,” she says. “And I’ve been through shit, so much shit in my life, I’m not going to shut up about it. I just want to be that girl I needed when I was 15 for someone, you know?”

She says her experience of school was “intense”, even before she was expelled “for a combination of bad grades and behaviour”. Her parents moved from the Philippines to London because they thought she would get a better education, but she suffered a breakdown aged 11, followed by the “isolating” experience of being one of only a handful of Filipino girls at her Hammersmith secondary school”.

It is amazing that beabadoobee has gone from those unhappy and unfulfilling years at school to where she is now in quite a short space of time! It is testament to her determination and love of music that she has built a fanbase and reputation so quickly. They do say that every great songwriter has to have experienced some sadness to be that good but, for beabadoobee, I think music provides her with the sense of direction and community that school lacked.

The 1990s is a fascinating period for beabadoobee, and I think she would have like to have lived it that period – as I shall reveal a bit later. I want to go back to that interview from The Standard, as it appears like beabadoobee has inspired quite a lot of teenagers to listen to music they might not have otherwise discovered:

“She’s also been responsible for introducing a lot of current teenagers to the wonders of Nineties music. Her most recent EP, Space Cadet, is packed with scuzzy guitar rock influenced by that decade, including She Plays Bass, which was inspired by Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth and D’arcy Wretzky of Smashing Pumpkins. Then there’s I Wish I Was Stephen Malkmus, in which this teenage girl born in Manila expresses a burning desire to be the 53-year-old frontman of Californian indie band Pavement. “This tripzz me out,” he tweeted when he heard it. Then he brought his children to one of her US shows to meet her, which caused a bit of excitement. “He went in for a handshake and I just jumped at him and said: ‘Iloveyousomuchthankyouforcoming!’” she gushes.

So what does she want to know about the Nineties? I was there the whole time. This news suddenly makes me much more interesting to her. If I tell her I saw Pavement play Reading Festival in 1995, it might be like someone back then telling me about The Beatles on the Apple Corps rooftop. “I guess it was much more wholesome and innocent back then?” she queries. “Because you didn’t have social media. But I guess you still had magazines and shit”.

Fake It Flowers kind of picks up where Space Cadet left off in terms of sounds and vibing off of the ‘90s. Not that the decade is entirely responsible for her sound and passion, but it is very important. Beabadoobee was interviewed by NME recently, and it does appear like she would have loved to have lived a few decades ago:

“So Bea wishes she was a ‘90s kid. Her bedroom is decorated with posters of the decade’s dominant film star, Tom Hanks, and at a recent show, the support act was a projection of his 1993 film . The first CD she bought was Green Day’s Dookie’, and she genuinely used to listen to cassettes instead of an iPod on the school bus.

“People think I’m just some quirky girl who pretends to love old movies, but I genuinely fucking do,” she says. “I’ve been obsessed and nostalgic because I never lived in that era. I’ve always wanted to live in the ‘90s and no-one says that, because they think it’s cringe. But pretty much all the people I listen to are dead now…”

PHOTO CREDIT: Jordan Curtis Hughes

One subject I have not touched on yet is the impact of social media and how, like all artists, beabadoobee is not immune to the negativity that is commonplace there. Although she personally does not get a lot of criticism on social media (as far as I know), she is aware of its impact, and it is hard to ignore it. It is such a shame that artists do have to face this unfiltered and thoughtless criticism and hatred from people, and, for beabadoobee, it has affected her. She spoke with NME and discussed social media viciousness:

“Have you had to deal with much negativity on social media?

“Getting hate sent to me is probably the hardest thing I’ve had to overcome. Some people think everything in my bedroom is so fake and all deliberately planted to make me out to be a quirky girl. I’m not really used to people being that mean about things I like. I’m very self-deprecating as it is, but the hate I see – I’m just not used to that. I’m trying to stop crying about it now.”

Has pushing back to haters influenced your music?

“I was so angry and emotional when I wrote ‘I Wish I Was Stephen Malkmus’ and I’m so glad I did. It felt so good to have all that self-love in the lyrics. I feel like I’m shouting at everyone who tells me not to be me. I love my blue-hair. Yes, I sit at home and cry to Pavement. Fuck what everyone else says”.

I just want to grab another passage from that NME interview, as there is a great bit regarding beabadoobee as a person. If you look at photos of her, you get this impression of someone who is very cool indeed! It was nice to read a little bit about what beabadoobee is like being interviewed:

“Bea has started dreaming of a bigger world and seems to be having quite a bit of fun doing so. She’s excitable and inquisitive, but with the blissed-out slacker vibes of her heroes. She’s also clearly still getting used to people being interested in her music and life. Before each answer she gives a moment’s thought before answering, and most of them end with a nervous chuckle.

In spite of this, she’s devastatingly cool. Her striking hair styles indicate her mood, like on self-love anthem ‘I Wish I Was Stephen Malkmus’, where she bigs up her new electric blue hair. “Every time I do something, I want to change my hair. It’s just as important in the music to me,” she says”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Jordan Curtis Hughes

There are a couple more things I want to tick off before I come to reviewing Together from Fake It Flowers. I am not going to review the whole album, but I would encourage people to investigate all of Fake It Flowers, as there is a great blend of sounds. It is clear that beabadoobee has developed and grown as a songwriter over the past year or two. When she spoke with The Forty-Five, we get a clearer impression of the sound of Fake It Flowers - and beabadoobee explains why the album sounds different to her previous work:

“Despite having already developed somewhat past it, ‘Fake It Flowers’ demonstrates a distinctly more ambitious and identifiable sound than anything Bea has released before. It’s not always an easy listen – some of the lyrical themes are so intimately personal that she says she’s unlikely to ever play certain songs live. Striking the balance between musical disclosure and self-preservation is an eternal battle, but she sees this record as an opportunity to embrace a new chapter, challenging herself to reflect upon everything that’s brought her to this point. Her intent is set not only in the music, but in her image – like each era before it, her newly blonde hair is an emblem of change – her very own version of a movie makeover montage.

“It’s a lot to do with me growing and maturing from touring,” she says. “I know I haven’t been on many, but I toured the US, and I did a headline UK tour with Dirty Hit, and, um, shit happened. I’ve made loads of mistakes; I’ve met a lot of people that weren’t so good to me. ‘Sorry’ is something that is so personal – admitting and confessing to my mistakes is one big thing I never usually do. Lyrically, there’s just so much more to reflect on, and with the sound, I guess, naturally after playing arenas with The 1975, I wanted to make songs that would fill those rooms. I wanted to sound powerful”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Ed Blow

I have listened to the tracks on the album, but I never thought of the significance of the album’s title, Fake It Flowers. Beabadoobee was asked about this when she was interviewed by Nylon:

“Is the album title Fake It Flowers a reference to anything, or is there any deeper meaning behind that?

It's quite funny, actually. I named the album that because every time I downloaded something on my phone, it would automatically save as "fake it flowers." If I was recording a demo in the studio or in my bedroom, it would just always automatically save as "fake it flowers." I found it really interesting because there was no flower shop near my house called Fake It Flowers, but found out that there was a shop called Fake It Flowers in my studio. It was like fate, all the songs just accidentally being saved under that name. I thought it was a really pretty name. That's the thing about flowers, that they are all so unique and beautiful in their own way”.

The last thing I want to discuss before moving on to the review concerns beabadoobee’s music and why it connects to people. She has a very large fanbase, and that covers all ages, genders, and corners of the globe. There is clearly something that resonates and speaks to people. Nylon were keen to know why her music inspired a lot of people:

I think they have a relatability with my writing because I think we are all around the same age. It's mostly girls like me who like the same things, who experience the same things. They find a similarity with that. And also the fact that, I was also reading some comments yesterday, that they do feel there's a bit of a nostalgic feeling they get when they listen to my music. And it's probably because their mom used to play it when they were growing up, or the movies they liked. I grew up listening to all this music.

My mom used to play all these amazing front-woman bands. I subconsciously just used that inspiration through my music without even realizing. I got back into all these artists that my mom used to play when I was really young. I discovered more, and I think people can hopefully hear that and recognize that. I think they find that quite comforting”.

I am going to move on now and review Together. It is one of the standout songs from Fake It Flowers, and one that perfectly showcases beabadoobee’s many talents and unique songwriting.

PHOTO CREDIT: Ed Blow

There is quite a lo-fi sound to Together. The guitar, at the start, is quite scratchy and there is this beat, but it is quite a naked and raw. It instantly has that flavour of ‘90s Indie and Alternative Rock, and beabadoobee’s voice is instantly gripping in its quiet intensity. The first verse is quite short, and we get to the chorus pretty quickly! That verse – “Crash the car again/The same mistakes again/Don't wanna hurt you like I did” - could be taken literally as an actual crash, but I get the sense that it is used as a metaphor. A lot of songs that deal with personal emotions and matters of the heart are quite oblique, and Together does not provide explanation as to what mistakes have been made and why things are like they are. This means that the listeners can work on their own interpretation; giving too much away might distil the song’s potency. There is a quiet-loud dynamic that means the verses are quieter and calmer in deliver, and there is this fire and explosion in the chorus. The guitars get quite grungy, and beabadoobee’s voice sharpens and becomes more impassioned. The words “'Cause I'm not waiting for you/But I don't want to hurt you” come along, and it got me to thinking. There is quite a bit of mystery and intrigue in those lines, and one wonders what has happened between the two and what the words mean. There seems to be that sense of contradiction: the heroine not holding out for her sweetheart, but she also does not want to hurt them either.

PHOTO CREDIT: Sarah Louise Bennett

I like the sound of the verses, as beabadoobee’s voice is smokier and there is this underlying tension that works through the composition. “All alone again/It hurts my heart again/I think my blood is running thin/I'm away again/It hurts my head again/Don't wanna be away from your skin”. The repetition of the word ‘again’ is quite effecting, and it does appear that there is a long history between the two - and our heroine has made the same errors a few times. The second chorus is longer than the first, and there is a little more exposition and revelation: “'Cause I'm not waiting for you/But I don't want to hurt you/Guess that's how my life will go/At least we're together though, together though/Together though, together though”. There is that idea of togetherness, even if one gets the impression that the two are separate and there is a division. Beabadoobee has this unique vocal sound that is very modern and her own, but one can definitely hear her musical inspirations in there too. Before the chorus comes back in, there is another short verse – “Hurt myself again/I thought you'd notice it/Don't wanna fix it like you did” -, that hints that her lover/friend has been a bit negligent and absent-minded, but there is that contradiction in the lyrics that takes your mind in different directions. You get this feeling that beabadoobee’s mind is a bit muddled, and she is still trying to find her way – “'Cause I'm don't want to let you know/I've been thinking of letting you go/Guess that's how the whole story ends”. The outro is one of the most memorable parts of the song. Beabadoobee’s voice is at its most intense and hypnotic, and there is this slight passage where there is a little bit of musical accompaniment but there is this strange intimacy. Then, the noise ratchets back up and we get this burst of intensity - “I think I'm okay by myself, I'm doing great/But we'd be better together, better together/Together though, together though, together again”. The song ends and, whilst it seems like the two would be great together and things would be better, beabadoobee needs to be on her own - or that is the only choice. Together is a song that will have you coming back, and it is one of the finest from the Fake It Flowers album.

PHOTO CREDIT: Callum Harrison

I shall wrap up soon but, just before, there are a couple of things I want to cover. I mentioned how beabadoobee has come a long way in a short time, and life now is very different to how it was when she was at school. Her music has taken her around the world, and she has made some pretty notable friends. The interview with NME gives more detail:

“She’s making more famous friends, and definitely not daunted about making the first step. When she supported Mac DeMarco in Dublin earlier this summer, the pair went out post-show, did karaoke and she ended the night with a Mac-designed tattoo of a face on her arm

Since she got a verified account on Twitter and Instagram, she’s been slipping and sliding into the DMs of any one of the heroes that’ll take her. First was Sonic Youth bassist Kim Gordon and Tom Hanks, though neither have responded as of just yet – “I’ve messaged them twice with the same thing; I’m that much of a beg” – but she did get a response from The Moldy Peaches’ singer Kimya Dawson, who was flattered by the message”.

This year has been a tough one for all artists, and beabadoobee was planning to get on the road and take her music far and wide. That is not going to happen for a while, and let’s hope that she gets to perform soon enough. Back in July, she spoke with i-D and she was asked how the pandemic was affecting her:

“As you say, it was supposed to be a big year for you in terms of tours and festivals. How was it mentally adjusting to such a massive shift in plan?

I remember it being really sad. I was obviously so gassed about doing all these shows and hanging out with my band in America... but America looks a bit fucked right now, so I’m glad that I had a breather.

PHOTO CREDIT: Patrick Gunning

And now you’re back at it and about to release the first single from your debut album! When you look back, do you remember what kind of person you were when you released your first song “Coffee” in 2017?

I was still in school and didn’t even think about music as being an actual thing I could do, so I never imagined any of this could happen. I released “Coffee” thinking it was just for fun, and something other than school to do with my friend Oscar. It was all very innocent and young and naive. I’m still kind of the same, but I guess the industry is becoming more familiar now”.

And what's your post-pandemic plan?

When this is all over, or when the album drops -- whichever comes first -- I wanna have a massive party. A princess-themed album party.

For friends and collaborators or for fans too?

Just for people that worked on the album and girlfriends from school. And I really want to do a show. I feel like if corona had never happened and Fake It Flowers was coming out, I’d do a show the next day, a random free show. That would’ve been the dream”.

I will leave it there, but I would urge people to pick up Fake It Flowers, as it is one of this year’s best albums. Beabadoobee has a great future ahead of her, and I think that she will be topping festival bills in the next few years. There is that mix of the deeply personal and the more universal in the music that has connected with so many people, and the tracks will definitely stay long in the mind. The tremendous beabadoobee will be putting out simply incredible music…