Girlpool feel like a different band on this record, a band that’s thoroughly wiser and passionately conscientious.
What Chaos Is Imaginary is the boldest statement yet for two young artists with clearly upward trajectories, though they’re clearly in different directions.
For a band that already left nothing wanting in terms of chemistry, What Chaos Is Imaginary brings Tucker and Tividad’s talents to the surface in entirely new and creative ways.
Each song is a new chapter offering insight into the multi-dimensional world that is Girlpool – and every one is more intricate, more complex, more captivating than the last.
Harmony and Cleo are still radically open, still tender, their music still invigorating. It’s been a time of transition, and both journey and destination sound good from here.
Girlpool’s evolution has accelerated once more, creating a world that’s extending deeper and louder.
Tividad's sun-kissed vocals, on top of the slow, dreamy instrumentals all over What Chaos Is Imaginary, makes the record feel cinematic.
This album offers a view into the minds of a pair of singular artists who might differ in their delivery, but who both understand that a glimpse of truth is a whole lot more intriguing than a disingenuous attempt at the whole thing.
On What Chaos is Imaginary, Girlpool recognize that the chaos that surrounds them will only help them strengthen their resolve.
On album number three, LA duo Cleo Tucker and Harmony Tividad take a widescreen approach to their eclectic alt-pop, alternating between dreamy soundscapes, country jangle and cacophonous shoegaze.
Weaving in and out of concrete, direct, indie-rock songwriting and meditative, impressionistic dream pop, Girlpool’s third album features their most expansive and surreal songs to date.
The result is an impressive balancing act, a sound grounded in the band’s tradition that is nevertheless constantly pushing forward.
A fuzz-driven album offering, laced with haunting harmonies and a lyrical wisdom far beyond their years.
What Chaos Is Imaginary is what a band in transition sounds like, but it dares to embrace that uncertainty—converting it into an asset, redefining in real time what Girlpool can mean.
Although willfully murky in a way that occasionally verges on the indecipherable, it's a wondrously open-minded record that treats all experiences, good or bad, as ripe for artistic sublimation.
What Chaos paints the band as more of a yin and yang, two disparate but complementary figures, than the mirror images they seemed to be on Girlpool’s older material.
As Tividad and Tucker explore their identities together and apart, What Chaos will probably look in retrospect like a necessary way station through which the duo passed on the way to someplace that feels a little more like home.
It's easy to lose your way here, as there aren't many big choruses to hook onto; and by the time we reach the generic shoegaze of "Roses," the duo seems to have misplaced their own compass.
A multidimensional, multi-faceted affair, full of fragile introspection and meandering guitars.
While there are several moments to savour, the more muscular approach ultimately does them few favours: one is left with the sense that they have traded in what made them different for a stab at fairly unadventurous alt-rock by numbers.
Even though some of the huge shake-ups of instrumentation and songwriting styles work well, Tucker and Tividad rarely sound like they're connecting and it makes What Chaos Is Imaginary harder to connect with.
Unfortunately, while there is a scattering of charming moments, it ultimately feels as though the unassuming allure of previous releases has been marginalised by the increasingly reinforced and methodical sound.
This was overwhelmingly mediocre
Girlpool return for their 3rd album with an effort that is equally as dreamy as it is dreary. The record starts off with a couple of energetic and semi-atmospheric tracks that really went well together, but unfortunately it drops off after Chemical Freeze and the rest of the album is relatively mundane, run-of-the-mill Indie Rock. Nothing new or special here, but it is okay I guess.
FAVORITE TRACKS: Chemical Freeze, Where You Sink
LEAST FAVORITE TRACK: Roses
The lyrics here remind of Jonah Hill attempting to do slam poetry in 22 Jump Street.
God, is this thing boring. The vocals aren't impressive enough to draw you to them, and the instrumentation, while serviceable, doesn't stand out very much from basic indie folk.
There's not a lot of energy here on the first half, when I feel like it could really have benefited from. Also. The mixing here is subpar at points.
It's not a bad project, as it does have an overarching theme and cohesiveness, just ... read more
to me, this album treads the grounds between dream pop and indie rock sensibilities in a way thats pretty refreshing and relaxing to me. The melodies and atmospheres that Girlpool creates on these songs are super fitting and endearing when paired with their voices. There is a melancholic sentiment that sits through the album that you can call cliche however theres also a sense of hopefulness which transcends that.
The messaging of this album to me is that the chaos around you can only make ... read more
this is...fine. not nearly as ~emotionally intense~ as their other releases. it sounds like something that critics would eat up even though nothing actually stands out. oh, NPR loved this album...this sounds like an album NPR would play, which is not a compliment. it's sleepy but it feels like something you're supposed to think is good even though you won't remember any of the songs once it's over.
1 | Lucy's 3:03 | 69 |
2 | Stale Device 3:10 | 68 |
3 | Where You Sink 3:22 | 70 |
4 | Hire 2:55 | 75 |
5 | Pretty 3:25 | 68 |
6 | Chemical Freeze 4:21 | 71 |
7 | All Blacked Out 3:07 | 66 |
8 | Lucky Joke 2:37 | 65 |
9 | Minute in Your Mind 2:21 | 64 |
10 | What Chaos Is Imaginary 5:23 | 69 |
11 | Hoax and the Shrine 2:37 | 60 |
12 | Swamp and Bay 3:12 | 60 |
13 | Josephs Dad 2:26 | 62 |
14 | Roses 3:32 | 60 |
#28 | / | Stereogum |
#31 | / | Thrillist |
#37 | / | Far Out Magazine |
/ | Esquire (UK) | |
/ | The FADER | |
/ | Vinyl Me, Please |