Kelela – new avatar
On new avatar, Kelela finds a path through as most great artists do – remaking themselves
The sub-two minute linknb represents a flex and a moment of vulnerable self-reflection. 'All I know is that I paved the way', she sings with an air of defiance, only to follow it with: 'Where do I go, when it’s me on my own?' It can be lonely and uncertain at the top; Kelela is one of the most unpredictable and experimental pop stars we have. This one-two punch is a sharp encapsulation of how assuredness in yourself can still bump up against a block. On new avatar, she finds a path through as most great artists do – remaking themselves.
Kelela’s discography has managed to be cerebral, exploring identity, movement, bodies and queerness through the lens of transformation, remaining wildly visceral and exciting. That word – avatar, with its connotations of both deity and digital, the sense that you can actualise yourself however you want – releases her to be, once again, 'a raven reborn' through surprising stylistic shifts. Compared to the ambient sprawl of Raven, this is a streamlined record of slinking processed guitars influenced by alt-metal, shoegaze and industrial, worked like putty into pop structures. It’s music for driving at night, for cityscapes degraded by digital grain and, as ever for Kelela, bathed in blue light.
Listen to: outta time (feat. A. K. Paul), crystalize, retaliation lullaby