Magdalena Bay - Mercurial World Review

    About 6 months later, I like this album even more. Originally, this album wasn't my favorite of 2o21, but now and probably for a long time, it'll continue to be my favorite. Every time I revisited this album, it turned out greater and greater.

    This is the Internet generation. Genres like Hyperpop, SoundCloud Rap and Digicore, Artists like Charli XCX, 100 gecs and Kero Kero Bonito are getting more and more popular. Magdalena Bay took a big influence from these things, combined with 80s synth-pop and new-wave, this album was the final result. If you look at this duo's website or Tiktok, it'll literally feel like a fever dream you dreamed of living in. At the same time, the music matched the look; weird and postmodern themes. Mostly the influence came from Charli XCX and Grimes, and they've even made a mashup for forever and Oblivion.

Their site mercurialworld.com

     They started this album with a very common title The End(just like Donuts and The Black Parade) which is 31 seconds. It sets a dreamy and funky vibe for the album and fairly does a great job. The three songs after this are sort of Nu-Disco and Synthpop, where they made the theme further and further. Starting with a dialogue between Mica and Matt, about online Internet secrets, the lyrics are getting sweeter and sweeter, but the dialogue is turning into a more robotic and dangerous vibe. At the end of Secrets (Your Fire), the natural sound unravels and becomes the start of the chaotic You Lose! You Lose! is probably the most stunning and creative track. Unlike the Dua Lipa or The Weeknd 80s revival try, this song mixes multiple genres into one song and makes it diverse, which is also an advantage of the album. The guitar distortion adds more grunge and a noisy vibe to a pop song, which is just pure fun. This song is a win of the year. The following up is a more simple and funky song called Something for 2. Then the vibe goes down to Chaeri, another sweet tune. 

    

    This mercurial world turns back with the interlude Halfway, and the second half is filled with sweetener and elegance. Hysterical Us is a sort of vaporwave song. The production value gets risen up with Prophecy. Mica's almost ASMR vibe vocal and those strings compliment each other so well in this song. The lyrics are so sweetened at the same time, and they match the ethereal and delicate strings perfectly. The theme turns mysterious with the song Follow the Leader, where Mica sounds like a robot. Domino has a dream-pop and trip-hop vibe. The last two songs Dreamcatching and The Beginning are the points where they got back to the surface. The mercurial world turns back to the bright side with Dreamcatching it almost felt like you live in a pink dreamy bubble. The beginning is the end and the end is the beginning, it goes into another cycle with The Beginning and colorfully ends the mercurial world.

     My favorite thing about this album is how diverse and miscellaneous it sounds as a pop album. At first, I expected this to be a pure joyful ride, like Dua Lipa or Carly Rae Jepsen, but it has blown my mind since You Lose! dropped. It's truly something different from what you normally hear. The collision between old-fashioned synthwave and hyperpop worked amazingly as well. There are synthy and aggressive songs in the same album, which adds an extra point to it. The album flow is another stunning point. With an actual lyrical theme, Mercurial World seems to be more cohesive and plump, which makes the theme sounds like a fever dream that you love to take part in. The writing feels saccharine at some point but in a good way. 

    With those being said, this is still a flawed World. Some songs in the second half seemed too lowkey for the whole concept. Hysterical Us and Dreamcatching could be forgettable sometimes because they aren't that outstanding compared to other moments on the album. Chaeri is a glamorous track on its own, but for me, it's a bit odd when I listen to it in the album format. Those flaws could empower the whole concept from your perspective, but I found them to be turnoffs. 

     Overall, it's a one-of-a-kind album. Matthew Lewin's dreamy production and Mica Tenenbaum's confectionary vocals make this world a win. There weren't a lot of albums that can sound old-fashioned and futuristic at the same time, but this one did it. I revisited it multiple times, and it still sounds fresh no matter how much I've listened to it. Now it's my album of 2021.