''Forever Music'' is the fifth studio album by Australian

experimental pop Experimental pop is pop music that cannot be categorized within traditional musical boundaries or which attempts to push elements of existing popular forms into new areas. It may incorporate experimental techniques such as musique concrète, al ...

musician

Katie Dey Katie Dey is an Australian experimental pop musician. Career Dey released her first album, ''Asdfasdf'', in 2015 with the label Orchid Tapes. Dey attracted the attention of Orchid Tapes founder Warren Hildebrand after Mat Cothran of Elvis Depres ...

self-released Self-publishing is the publication of media by its author at their own cost, without the involvement of a publisher. The term usually refers to written media, such as books and magazines, either as an ebook or as a physical copy using POD (pr ...

on 28 January 2022. The album was preceded by two singles, "Unfurl" and "Real Love", as well as a music video for "Real Love". The album's cover art was designed by Iron T Hawk.

Background

Along with the announcement of the album, Dey released a statement in which she described the record as being "about the eternal power of music and genuine love between women" and "staying alive as long as possible, in defiance against all odds, through life-threatening sickness in world made to hurt ou doing what little things possible to care for the people you love the most." She also listed her inspirations for the record:

Tori Amos Tori Amos (born Myra Ellen Amos; August 22, 1963) is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. She is a classically trained musician with a mezzo-soprano vocal range. Having already begun composing instrumental pieces on piano, Amos won a full ...

Utada Hikaru , who is also known by the mononym Utada, is a Japanese-American pop singer, songwriter and producer. By 2010, Utada had become one of the most influential, and best-selling, musical artists in Japan. Born in the United States to Japanese parent ...

Prince A prince is a male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary, in some European states. Th ...

Ryuichi Sakamoto is a Japanese composer, pianist, singer, record producer and actor who has pursued a diverse range of styles as a solo artist and as a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra (YMO). With his bandmates Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi, Sakamoto inf ...

Regina Spektor Regina Ilyinichna Spektor (russian: Регинa Ильинична Спектор, ; born February 18, 1980) is a Russian–born American singer, songwriter, and pianist. After self-releasing her first three records and gaining popularity in ...

, JPEGMafia, and

Hatsune Miku , also called Miku Hatsune, and officially code-named CV01, is a Vocaloid software voicebank developed by Crypton Future Media and its official moe anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic mascot character, a 16-year-old girl with long, turquoise bu ...

. The album was written, performed, recorded, mixed, and

mastered Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via meth ...

by Dey in her home studio in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

, Australia.

Style and reception

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to th ...

''s Colin Joyce called ''Forever Music'' a step away "from the bleak feelings of her early, glitch-scoured work" removed from "the bleak feelings that clouded her early work" where she's now "singing about the possibility of love and the sudden appeal of perseverance when you have something or someone worth living for." The music consists of "simpler, gentler arrangements of voice, keys, and plodding percussion" with vocals "deliberately 'unfiltered and dry', which feels like a bold choice for a musician who made her name with digitalist contortions." Joyce says the album's "unadorned arrangements give Dey the space to conjure some real emotional weight" and that her "voice carries desperation, weariness, and then, eventually, joy." While her previous album's production "concealed the special contours of her instrument", ''Forever Music''s "lets her evoke both the bad times and the good, lending depth to the darkness and real color to the moments where she realizes she might make it through."

Track listing

References

{{Reflist 2022 albums Katie Dey albums Self-released albums