Today Sophie Hunger releases new single ‘Tricks’, taken from her brand new studio album ‘Molecules’ released on 31st August on Caroline International.
Tricks, featuring an analogue CS80 synth and a Krautrock beat, is similarly political to previous single ‘She Makes President’, listing the rewards lavished on politicians and business people who set out to deceive the public. “This has always been the mechanics of power structures”, Hunger states, “but the question in my mind is, what do these guys do when all their tricks have come true?”
Sophie Hunger has long been synonymous with a minimalist folk-jazz hybrid that put her in step with fellow travellers like Laura Marling and Feist. But having recently made the move to Berlin, she discovered electronic music, became a frequent visitor to the Berghain club on Sunday nights and developed an interest in modular synths, for which Berlin is a mecca. The songs she wrote in her home studio (which were later recorded with producer Dan Carey in South London) do her proud.
‘Molecules’ is Hunger’s first full album in English, and is what she describes as “minimal electronic folk”. Her most compelling qualities – an ingenue-like delicacy and contrasting solitary darkness - haven’t changed. Familiar trickles of funfair weirdness still permeate the music, calling to mind Beth Orton and Regina Spektor. Moreover, she’s still enigmatic and self-possessed to the point where it feels too intrusive to ask certain questions.
Molecules bears witness to her defiance and intellectual credibility in a post-truth age of ignorance. Female (and male) pop fans in search of a nuanced, intelligent role model could do worse than to keep an eye on her.
