Jade Imagine
You Remind Me of Something I Lost
Milk! Records/Remote Control
Following the release of 2019 debut album Basic Love, Melbourne band Jade Imagine have returned with the release of a new EP, You Remind Me of Something I Lost.
The four songs deliver a 16-minute journey that is both artful and brimming with reflective introspection, but also glistens with moments of quiet passion. Opening track Coastal Pines is a dreamy and jangly exploration of the contrast between the city and the sea which immediately transports you to a sun-drenched summer afternoon.
Heavy Machines gives a more muscular performance with singer Jade McInally’s vocals set in the background of a mechanical and ominous bass line. The intensity changes again with the sinewy, trancelike rhythm guitar of Things Just Happen for You. The song is evocative of an alt-rock version of Angel Olsen combined with the instrumentation of the Bad Seeds. The EP concludes almost as smoothly as it begins with the stripped back lullaby Feelin’ Blue. It’s a passionate and moving track which surrounds you like the sensation of being underwater in the ocean.
You Remind Me of Something I Lost is not an EP that vies for your attention with cheap hooks and sonic sideshows. It won’t wait around begging you to come and listen. But nonetheless, it creates an atmosphere of hushed intensity and unassuming cool that slowly draws you in.
The band’s sound fits in well with the eclectic mixture of music that comes out from various labelmates on Courtney Barnett and Jen Cloher’s cult-ish Milk! Records. While it lacks the more energised pop-orientated dynamic of their 2017 debut EP, What the Fuck was I Thinking, Jade Imagine’s latest offering shows with concrete certainty that the band is a creative force to be reckoned with.
LACHLAN HARDMAN
