daine ventures further into ephemera with no fear on shapeless

daine has far from stuck to a conventional release schedule so far: tracks like “SALT” – which borrows Bring Me The Horizon’s Oli Sykes on side to deliver innovation at maximum levels – and “boythots” were both feverishly received, but sit alone as singles rather than on mixtapes to push listenership up. With that in mind, though each release sees a new strand of daine’s musical psyche unwind, part of what makes them so excellent is that each one is distinct and totally self-contained.

Their latest is another expertly tuned closed-loop whirlpool, maintaining cohesion whilst still splitting at the seams with explorations and influences that are the vessel for daine’s diaristic outpourings. Despite taking aim at numerous painful flecks of contemporary society – which daine does frequently, with conviction and rage – shapeless is still overall an introspective listen. Title track “shapeless” on the surface could be seen as any level of critique of plastic surgery, instagram-face culture, but rather than do that overtly, it’s a swirling, pulsing enactment of how it feels to be inside the machine: “boobs fake eyes fake teeth fake faceless, i got it all now i’m shapeless” is half a flex, half an identity-seeking mantra.

Hyperpop has long overlapped with the lo-fi pop-punk renaissance, and daine joins the ranks of those pushing the genre forward with relish: “stay close” opens with a delightfully almost-Taking Back Sunday guitar riff, but daine dives in over the top in luxurious autotune and moody understated melody that couldn’t be further from the whiny emo canon they’re evoking in twisted elements of the instrumental. “Writhe” also dials up the guitar, diving from hyperpop to sub-pop and letting some of the mixtape’s most naturalistic vocals echo and reverb in the emotional hall of mirrors daine navigates in their lyrics.

Elsewhere, their alt touches are less explicit, but put their legwork into the overarching aesthetic of the release – the infectious melodic flow of “smb2l” is as catchy as the best of them, with lilting refrains and the smooth hooks that emo choruses do so well, but the glossy indie-pop sonics do their job in disrupting it flawlessly. Similarly, “skin deep” takes its place as one of the mixtape’s darkest, but somehow vents that emotion through a 3012-buoyant future-pop window.

On shapeless, daine does more than showcase their effervescent, excellent hyperpop-emo creds and traverses the fluctuating genre landscape that defines pretty much all pop music of the moment. In a way that feels immediate, natural, and effortless, shapeless puts a soundtrack to this era of daine. It doesn’t give away much more of the bigger picture, and it’s not quite clear yet how it will interact with it, but daine builds new dimensions with every move.