Fever Ray : "Plunge"

It opens in a manner not unlike her other work. She is sticking to what she does as a singer. Which is along the lines of Cyndi Lauper being remixed as she is in the process of singing. The electronic backing tracks do not seem to have as much depth as her previous work. "Musn't Hurry" is not bad , but it sounds like she is running in place rather than moving forward as an artist. Their is an oriental feel to the intervals of the synths bubbling around "A Part of Us" . There is some more experimental ambiance around the corners of "Falling" . The song just throbs off of the one groove without going anywhere. "IDK About You" is more upbeat . Her vocals take on more of a sing song cadence. The backing track just seems like it's there and not really giving her much support even when it builds up.

On "This Country" the synths continue with their journey into the Orient. The vocals have a more desperate sexuality to them. There is not really a chorus to speak of so nothing really hooks you in . I do like the lyrics to this song the most of what I have heard six songs in despite their extreme leftist slant. Her primary sentiment is this country makes it hard to fuck. Oddly the title track  is an unneeded instrumental that sounds like video game music for kids. "To the Moon and Back" is the odd single I first heard from this album that left me under whelmed. The vocal shows more of her Bjork influence. Listening to the song in the context of the album it sits a little better with me, but is far from being her most compelling work.

She goes back to a more familiar sound on "Red Trails". With lines like "waiting on your love to happen/ is like waiting for a drug that never kicks in" this might be the album's strongest song. It also has strings on it so the first song with some kind of organic instrumentation. "An Itch" also falls more along the lines of what we expect here. The vocal draws you into the otherwise sparse instrumentation.This album took time for it to grow on me. Eventually it connected with me like her previous work, but it took some warming up to. I'll give it a 9.