Description
Thelmas origin seems to suggest that Natasha Jacobs musical abilities sprouted from the singer-songwriter almost spontaneously, whilst she convalesced after a life-changing fall from a ladder. Although there is surely more of a back-story than that, this was when she started writing songs and playing guitar.
The Brooklyn, NY-based project itself began two years later as a solo endeavor but soon became a band when Daniel Siles, Maciej Lewandowski, and Juan Pablo Siles joined. On Thelmas self-titled debut, Natasha doubles down on at least one aspect of the tale; she asserts her right to be fallen. In doing so, Thelma reveals both a self that has been projected onto her as well as the fantasy of her own projected self. While the songwriters falsetto is effortless and pure its brilliant intricacies conveying playfulness and impetuousness these seven songs are anything but pure.
They make no pretense of representing a natural or spontaneous expressive moment. They are fastidious. And they are gigantic. If anything, the songs exude that most impure, un-sweet, un-angelic motivation: ambition. Within the lyrics too there is a thematic insistence on the writer not wanting to be pure or objectified.
Above all, Thelma demonstrates real work; an exacting, intricate, sometimes beautifully sparse production with contrastingly serendipitous vocals. It demands attention to the band as a whole, and to Natasha Jacobs work as a composer, vocalist, and a wildly intense guitarist. Akiva Zamcheck
Reviews
There are no reviews yet.