Freebie Friday #2

Guess who’s back, back again? If you guessed Slim Shady, you’d be wrong. It’s his younger, less successful brother Slim Payday. Not returning by popular demand, just simply by undercutting the competition. Back again, for those of you who see an overdraft as a challenge not a limit, to deliver the magical side of the music world offering their wares for the nothing in return. Welcome back to Freebie Friday.

This week, we move away from the dance music vibes which I showcased last week here with the Confession Label and on to the work of Negative Gemini aka Lindsey French from Brooklyn, New York. Body Work was released on her Bandcamp a little over a week ago with a couple of songs in its repertoire, and it’s a great representation of what electropop has to offer. The songs are incredibly immersive, with haunting lingering vocals coupled with a melodic synth and thumping bass that lend themselves to being put on repeat.

Admittedly, with lyrics like, “You only hate the ones you love, and I was always hating you” the sentiments can’t be described as unrequitedly happy like the standard pop genre. However, instrumentally it’s very soothing, even erring towards upbeat. That’s where this electronic pop fusion has excelled; it truly gets across a mix of emotion that’s more relatable than Zayn Malik telling audiences he’ll “hold us hard and mellow”, which maybe gives too strong of an image of what happens on 1D’s tour bus. Definitely, Negative Gemini manages to show a multi-faceted range of emotions in these free releases.

With all this praise, it’s no surprise that Negative Gemini is playing SXSW festival, a fantastic place to check out loads of new artists as well as more established ones. Unfortunately, SXSW doesn’t worship the concept of the zero as we do here and will charge you entry. For those of you, like me, that consider pasta with sauce a delicacy, you may have to simply wait till next week for another series of freebies. Until then Viva la revolución!

Download Body Work here.