Amateur review: joyous synth-pop to melt away cynicism”>
For nearly two decades now Molly Nilsson has created a monochromatic DIY synth-pop fantasia. The Swedish artist is a prolific songwriter whose lyrical preoccupations have evolved over time, shifting from morbid and romantic in the early days to more political at a time when populist sentiment and capitalism have taken hold on society and become a more pressing concern than finding love. On her latest album, Amateur, she attempts to split the difference, celebrating the joyous parts of life while holding the bastards that try to grind you down at arms length.
“How Much Is The World” asks questions of a system set up in which the many work to make the few richer. In a world where everything has a (fastly increasing) price Nilsson ponders, how much does it cost to feel alive? “Swedish Nightmare,” meanwhile, posits love as the antidote for 21st century burnout. Even the most jaded of souls would struggle to deny Nilsson’s suggestion that “something great could really happen” is extremely tempting. Doing it on a wistful dance-pop track that feels like a balmy summer’s evening only makes it more so.
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Aiding her mission to breathe life into the exhausted and the brow-beaten is some of Nilsson’s most joyful music to date; where once her synths were hazy and amorphous enough to seep between the cracks, Amateur is taut. This spiky energy takes the album from the punk bar to the club, tethering the furious “Get A Life” to piano house tune “Classified.”
Staving off cynicism can be hard. Amateur isn’t Nilsson stepping into mindfulness and offering vague self-actualisation aphorisms about seizing the day from her 5 am cold plunge. It’s someone offering a rallying cry to keep the things that can’t be monetized alive; taking risks, keeping an open mind, and learning from errors along the way. Nilsson’s belief that this can make a material difference is an effective, and convincing, remedy for pessimistic minds.
