Rosie Tucker, Never Not Never Not Never Not

[New Professor Music, March 8]

Rosie Tucker’s sophomore album is as rowdy as it is tender, an emotive, guitar-forward trip inspired by the “queer, blacklisted, and forgotten female songwriters of the 1960s.” There’s a warm, barroom-like quality to songs like “Gay Bar” and “Spinster Cycle,” which overflow with clever, descriptive lyrics that set a scene as well as they unspool Tucker’s livewire stream of consciousness. The same goes for album standout “Lauren,” a gorgeous illustration of Tucker’s versatile vocal range that doubles as an empathetic portrait of a friend struggling with bipolar disorder. Though Never Not Never Not Never Not exhales with atmospheric tracks like “Real House Music” and the starry-eyed “Iceberg,” it’s Tucker’s ear for robust, rollicking hooks that buoy the album’s best songs. Songs like “Fault Lines” and “Pablo Neruda” buzz with a tipsy, infectious energy, while “Shadow Of The Doubt” has a chorus that just won’t quit. [Randall Colburn]

Self Esteem, Compliments Please
[Fiction, March 1]

Rebecca Lucy Taylor is best known as half of the fantastic U.K. folk-pop duo Slow Club, which is to say that in the U.S. she’s not especially known at all. Now Slow Club has run its course, and Taylor has released a new record under the moniker Self Esteem, infusing her old band’s evolution toward torchier material with a newly poppy swagger. Some of the record’s numerous highlights, like “Steady I Stand,” sound a bit like Slow Club tunes with a more aggressive backbeat. Others wield less expected influences; “Monster” has a bouncy lilt recalling Hamilton’s Beyoncé riff “Helpless.” Compliments Please is a little long for a shot of pure pop, and a little self-conscious about its status as a solo jaunt (its opening track is a sample of a musician explaining why it’s hard to stay in a band, as if the album requires exposition). But its abundance—of songs, of hooks, of heartfelt and relatable lyrics—mostly feels like a gift. “I did the best that I could, babe,” Taylor sings on ebullient standout “The Best,” and it’s easy to believe her. [Jesse Hassenger]

 
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