Tracey Thorn Returns With Soaring Synth-Pop Anthem “Queen”

Mike Wass | January 17, 2018 5:48 pm
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I didn’t realize how much I missed Tracey Thorn’s world-weary voice until the opening line of “Queen.” The Everything But The Girl vocalist has an uncanny way of drawing you into a narrative and this very-adult reflection on life’s twists and turns is one of her best. “What happened if we never met, if I just ignored those sliding doors?” she ponders over Ewan Pearson’s gloriously ’80s synth-pop production. “Am I queen or something else I might have been, a star backseat of a blacked-out car?”

“Queen” is the first taste of Tracey’s pragmatically-titled Record. What can we expect from the pop veteran’s new album? “Nine feminist bangers,” according to the press release. “I think I’ve always written songs which chronicle the milestones of a woman’s life,” she explains. “Different ages and stages, different realities not often discussed in pop lyrics. If 2010’s Love and Its Opposite was my mid-life album — full of divorce and hormones — then Record represents that sense of liberation that comes in the aftermath.”

Tracey also describes it as comparatively upbeat to her previously offerings. “I wanted it to be a record you’d listen to in the daytime,” she reveals. “On your headphones or on the move. Not necessarily in the evening, or in your bedroom.” It’s notoriously difficult to make pop for adults, but the “Missing” hitmaker has it down to a fine art. Watch the moody video, which finds the 55-year-old going for a nighttime drive, below.

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