Software
If Autre Ne Veut’s Anxiety is vaguely chlorine-scented it isn’t because it — like so many of its PBR&B contemporaries — is scrubbed clean; it’s because it’s drenched in semen. Which is to say that it is sexy but in a very specific way: It’s like a desperate last-call hookup with the only remaining person at the bar meaning it’s frantic disgusting and way way hotter than hooking up with a Nalgene-toting WASP-y international development student named Caley (Kayleigh?) from fucking Kingston Ont. Anxiety ’s brand of R&B like that hookup is less about romance more about waking up alone covered in blood and piss and fecal matter. Pro tip: Burn your sheets.
Which is to say that Anxiety is a complex LP: It’s trouser-ruining future R&B. It’s demented and sociopathic. It’s relentlessly intelligent and self-reflective. It’s more extroverted than Anxiety ’s ambient-leaning Body EP. And Arthur Ashin its songwright balances each permutation so well you can barely see the seams. Anxiety at first glance is highlighted by dreamily cinematic drifters (“Ego Free Sex Free”) KY-slick R&B (“Promises”) and glitchy electro (“I Wanna Dance With Somebody”). Yet the LP’s most arousing moments come if you dare peek beneath Ashin’s trench coat: Sordid sax squalls undermine the future-pop of “Counting.” The buzzsaw guitars paired with layered vocals of “Warning” are part church hymnal part acid trip gone awry. Opener “Play by Play” which aggressively repeats the line “don’t ever leave me alone” hides an ominous soundscape beneath celestial Korg harp and Ashin’s near-vengeful confidence. By the time Anxiety ’s done — leaving only a trail of bodily fluids in its wake — you might indeed need a change of undies. But trust us: It’s well worth it.
