When I first encountered SOPHIE, they were an unknown, faceless producer creating erratic and disjointed hard electronic music, teaming up with the very sugary pop darlings GFOTY and QT, and dropping beats that once had me surrounded by health goths in a tucked-away stage at Laneway Festival.
Tracks like ‘LEMONADE’ and ‘HARD’ developed SOPHIE’s cult-like following, she was producing for top names like Charlie XCX, Madonna, and MØ, but we still had no fuckin’ idea who she was.
A couple of years later and SOPHIE’s dropped her debut album OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES, a collection of tracks exploring materialism and aesthetics, as she finally shows a face to attach to the shiny, taut, sleek art-pop – something that sounds like it’s projected from the speakers of a PVC-clad robot doll from the future.
Teased out over a couple of months with singles like ‘It’s Okay To Cry’, we began to learn the vulnerabilities of SOPHIE as an artist and a transgender woman, peeling back the plastic-fantastic wrap to learn more about a woman who has presented herself as a faceless product for the last five years.
I hope you don’t take this the wrong way
But I think your inside is your best side
The whole album ranges from gentle, ethereal vocals, pitch manipulated for maximum innocence, to the erratic, chaotic and nearly-industrial soundscapes that are classic SOPHIE staples, expansive instrumentals interludes that feel like they should be the soundtrack to a time-lapse of a trip over a huge, rolling desert or ocean.
It’s a sonically immersive journey through identity, self-exploration, and hyper-realism, and it cleared my fkn skin it’s so strong and slick.
Standout tracks include the abrasive and dislocated ‘Pony Boy’ and absolute party banger ‘Immaterial’ – seriously hook that shit straight up to my veins, I can definitely picture myself getting loose to the latter at 2am in a divey club somewhere.
SOPHIE’s fans have reacted accordingly, one even pointing out the aural beauty of the name itself.
yoo sophie’s album is called oil of every pearl’s un-insides bc when you say it out loud it sounds like i love every person’s insides
— lindsaylosam (@lindsaylosam) May 27, 2018
https://twitter.com/FuzzyProxy/status/1008687863326822403
@SOPHIEMSMSMSM‘s “oil of every pearl’s un-insides” somehow sounds like the past & the future at the same time
— jennifer (@jennifera1egria) June 17, 2018
Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides slaps unreasonably hard
— jizzy vessel (@hostilehole) June 17, 2018
I’m gunna have to give SOPHIE’s OIL OF EVERY PEARL’S UN-INSIDES a solid 4.5/5 because hot damn it fucking SLAPS.
It’s out now on Future Classic, and everywhere you get your music.
