New York, NY (Top40 Charts) The UK's Loraine
James makes her highly-anticipated return with the release of Reflection, out this Friday, 6/4, on Hyperdub. Ahead of the release, she shares her newest single for "Running Like That" ft. Eden Samara, with a video to release later this week. Earlier singles include "Simple Stuff" and "Let's Go."
"Running Like That" explores the shadow world of dreams. Eden says it involves being chased by the voices in your head: "I was imagining a car chase between someone and their shadow self." The lyrics play out like an anxious conversation, the dreamy R&B of Loraine's music tries to soothe and temper the fever. Animator Rob Heppel's video for the song sees the duo escaping from a CGI hellscape of burning forest, rotating the setting of the song to a nightmare of environmental catastrophe.
Reflection exists in that complicated headspace where one's desires are weighed against the realities of the world. It's the love of performance juxtaposed with stage fright ("Self Doubt"), craving connection in an era of disease ("
Reflection"), and hoping for a better future in the face of dire circumstances. ("We're Building Something New"). Loraine lies at the album's center, the anchor whom Bandcamp praised as "keeping her influences varied and her emotions and personal experience at the core of her albums."
Loraine
James sees the grand possibilities in our horizons. Growing up in Enfield, London, the young producer honed her craft while gazing thoughtfully at the skyline out her window, enthralled by the view and observant of how it shifted. There, Loraine refined her sound, a mix of jazz, electronica, UK drill and grime, a mix she attributes to her mother's taste and her hometown's multiculturalism. It's the sound of queer anxiety, righteous fury, and wonder channeled reassembled through her intuitive skills and intimate, almost diaristic approach to music making. Both the Quietus and DJ Mag chose her second LP, For You and I (2019), as the #1 album of the year. A busy live schedule headlining and supporting acts such as Telefon Tel Aviv,
Jessy Lanza and Holly Herndon followed, as well as demand as a remixer, before Covid ground everything to a halt.
Loraine took advantage of the lockdown to work on her next EP Nothing for Hyperdub in 2020 as well as self-releasing EPs on Bandcamp and using a steady flow of remixes, from
Jessy Lanza to Gordi and others to sharpen her skills. She also started a monthly show on NTS radio and performed at Adult Swim's annual music festival. To top the year off, Loraine completed and delivered her third album Reflection for Hyperdub, made in the summer of 2020. Her first show of 2021 was Fascinated By, a collaboration with the performance artist
Isabel Lewis commissioned by the influential CTM Festival, Berlin.
