reviewed Elena Gritzan
“I’m so excited, I just got your e-mail,” sings Pascale Mercier on her new EP as Mathematique. That pretty much sums up my reaction when this three-song set landed in our inbox – Mercier plays with Jef Barbara and Karneef, and has played shows with the likes of Trust and Blue Hawaii, so I expected that her music would land in my musical sweet spot.
And indeed it did. “RL Touch” starts out incredibly softly with a build-up of sweetly scaling synths. The instrumental song is quickly joined by electronic organ tones and an arrhythmic heartbeat percussion line. The same tone pallet is used throughout, weaving the three songs together. Mercier’s vocals don’t come in until “Summer, but I don’t know,” though her vocal tone and sustained-vowel enunciation is a highlight of the EP.
“Summer, but I don’t know” is encapsulated within its title – it is cheery and grand, but underlaid with a sense of doubt and unease. The expansive instrumentals and soaring chorus express a certain joie de vivre, even if the narrator is unsure of her choices and where she is going in her life. “I feel so alive,” she sings. “But I don’t know.”
The remix of the song adds in piano and violin dramatics, as well as a new beat. Seeing the songs through the lens of a remixer adds depth and variety to the EP. The third song, “Yawun,” was reimagined by Plurabelle to be fitted with electronic bug buzzing, though the original song pits the drawn-out vocals against a fast tempo with sampled string pizzicato.
Mercier is reportedly working on a full-length record for the fall, and based on this introduction, it looks like it is going to be a powerful force indeed.
Rating: Proud Hoot (Really Good)
Top Track: “Summer, but I don’t know”
