EMA's latest sounds like lava slowly taking over control

EMA

"Exile in the Outer Ring"

Release date: 25 August 2017

8/10

03 September 2017, 11:30 | Written by Carolina Centeno

(Albums)

(EMA)

EMA’s Exile in the Outer Ring screams solemnity. It's a sober journey where EMA grabs her feelings and turns them into a state where music is feelings and feelings are music.

"I Wanna Destroy" is contained anger. Here, EMA's words reveal a craving to break with a frustrating state of insignificance and irrelevance. Her music does not have a climactic explosion, instead, it's a progression of intensity, steady and restless – lava slowly taking over control.

Contrasting with this aggressive scenario, "Blood and Chalk" brings a docile melody which exposes vulnerability and helplessness: a wave of weakness after a fever of resentment. Anger to vulnerability, vulnerability to apathy.

The numbness of depression is explored in "Down and Out", a melancholic sigh which leaves us not knowing whether to feel beat down or inspired.

Together, her words and music create a powerful and meaningful album which tells us that life is hard, but we are not alone’. EMA is talking to us in Exile in the Outer Ring, and we ought to listen.