Webster, Faye: Underdressed At The Symphony (Coloured Vinyl LP)
Late last year Faye Webster released two of the album singles, teasing the forthcoming project. “But Not Kiss” was a tension-filled first peek at the record. “It’s damn near ecstatic in ambiguity, but it’s not a song about indecision. Webster knows exactly what she wants, and what she doesn’t want; it just so happens that in doing so she ends up in yet another liminal space,” said The Fader. She followed it up with the meditative “Lifetime.” Both songs explore the rarely mapped territory of emotional intimacy, where desire and passion are in conflict with comfort, understanding and even platonic love.
These themes are found throughout Underdressed at the Symphony, alongside hyper-specific imagery that paints a picture of Webster’s life, like her eBay Purchase history (“eBay Purchase History”) or the physical objects she covets (“Lego Ring”). All of these uniquely Faye thoughts are wrapped in the warm glow of her otherworldly vocals, ever present pedal steel and her cinematic and sweeping string arrangements but also more unpredictable elements like vocoder can be found on the new album. “Her music defies genre and convention,” said Vulture last year. “Over the course of four albums, her sound has come to contain both pedal steel and indie rock as well as soft vocals and R&B sensibilities, all the while embodying the city of Atlanta.”
A self-taught guitarist by elementary school, with a deep love of bluegrass and country running in her family, Webster was bound to be a musician. At just 16 she released her debut album, Run & Tell. Like other teenage phenoms Jackson Browne and Laura Marling, it exhibited stunning lyrical and artistic clarity. Her Southern roots were obvious but Webster had more than country music inspiring her worldview - she was deeply embedded in the culture of her hometown, Atlanta. Lil Yachty was her classmate, she was sneaking out to see underground shows and fortuitously had befriended rapper/producer Ethereal while in High School. She went on to sign to Awful Records, making her label-mates with Father, Playboi Carti and Ethereal. To the outsider, an odd home but Webster shared the same weirdo art-kid ethos of her label mates - impossible to peg, endlessly experimenting, making shit, doing stuff, genre-fluid rule breakers.
Her 2017 self-titled release on Awful brought her enough notoriety to get her signed to Secretly Canadian, the home of ANOHNI, Porridge Radio, Whitney, Yoko Ono and more. Two years later, she released Atlanta Millionaires Club to widespread critical acclaim. “Few R&B albums have a pedal steel; few alt- country albums have a rap feature. Faye Webster’s Atlanta Millionaires Club somehow has all of the above. Even stranger, she manages to smooth these apparent contradictions into serene folk-pop with a mellow soul tinge. Webster is an anomaly, but her arty individualism represents an important common value,” said Pitchfork.
A multi-hyphenate talent, Webster also is a successful photographer who has shot campaigns for Killer Mike, Offset, D.R.A.M, Nike and other brands. She is a sometimes model and full-time yoyo enthusiast. Of her last album, I Know I’m Funny haha, Pitchfork said, “Webster is an assassin who comes out of the shadows with something witheringly funny or totally devastating.” It’s these flourishes of her unmatched individualism that makes her so exciting to listen to, and with Underdressed at the Symphony, Faye Webster enters a thrilling next chapter.
Blue vinyl version.
- Thinking About You
- But Not Kiss
- Wanna Quit All the Time
- Lego Ring (ft. Lil Yachty)
- Feeling Good Today
- Lifetime
- He Loves Me Yeah!
- ebay Purchase History
- Underdressed at the Symphony
- Tttttime