Like an Anime heroine, Grimes, a.k.a. Claire Boucher, spirits her listeners away to a strange world of cyber-pop symphonies. “You touch me within and so I know I could be human once again,” sighs a ghostly voice in a shell of synthetic sound on “Skin”. There’s a fragile, crystalline quality to the music; if you listen too hard it might crack. Blissed-out vocals pitch on the dark side of cutesy, with over- tones of Kylie (“Oblivion”) and Enya (“Genesis” and “Symphonia IX”), but these real or imagined influences are only vague vocal stylings: this music is her all her own. Grimes’ sound is less art school, more white cube in Visions, her fourth release, fusing diverse fragments, from punky J- Pop to glitch, creating a cohesive, polished product. The album revolves around elements of all things electro – there are synths aplenty, but this isn’t an Eighties stealathon. A touch of wistful throwback, sure, but Grimes manages to produce a kind of nostalgia for the future, visions of a reimagined American teen dream, complete with sports stadiums, hip-hop hoodies and interpretive dance rather than dancehalls, prom queens and Wayfarers. At once organic and metallic, ethereal and grungy, Visions is a retro-futuristic glimpse of post-cool pop.

Key Tracks: “Oblivion”, “Be a Body”, “Skin”