Use Me - Pvris
After what seems like half a year…oh wait, it has been half a year, Pvris (pronounced ‘Paris’) continue their legacy of spooky dance music with the highly anticipated release of ‘Use Me’ their third album. After some controversy within the band, we have been falling out of our seats, waiting to find out how the release would go and what this would mean for the future of the band. I listened to Use Me from start to finish and this is what I thought.
To talk about the contents of the record, we first need to go back to their past few tracks. The Hallucinations EP debuted towards the back end of 2019 and served as a teaser for what was to come. I had taken a bit of a hiatus from the band, not really having bothered with their last album I wasn’t sure what to expect when the EP stumbled across my path, but it had been fate. The start of 2020 saw a lot of us feeling downtrodden and not very hopeful for the future, and it was becoming harder and harder to ignore my responsibilities as a university student. I was spending a lot of time up late at night, painting, writing, dodging attendance emails and generally enjoying the quietness of springtime nights – I was on an opposite sleep schedule to my housemates so being the only one awake at 3AM was not a rare occurrence. I had always been one for loud, angry punk, especially at this time, but felt a hole in my soul and no matter how many angry Americans were screaming in my ear, it would not be filled. I didn’t really search for them, instead a couple of records fell into my lap, namely Feel Something by Movements, WWAF,WDWG? by Billie Eilish and, drum roll please, Hallucinations.
Each song on the record was different and satisfied a unique need. Wanted something that made you feel sh*t about your relationship status that had bounce? Old Wounds. Wanted something that made you feel sh*t about your relationship status that had hard bass? Death Of Me. It had the groove, it had the emo, by the end I wasn’t sure whether to dance or cry – or both. And this was great. This was exactly what I needed while painting little plastic men in the lonely, early hours of the morning under a dim lamp.
So what is the difference between the EP and the LP? What has changed since October? Well I’m not sure we were expecting a huge difference between the records, as the EP was clearly used to warm us up for their big release, but if I’m completely honest, I found my first listen of Use Me pretty disappointing. When AWKOHAWKOH (Pvris’s second album) saw its debut back in 2017 it was, in many people’s eyes, a much less interesting reel than their first album, White Noise, which put them on the map and saw them play festivals all over the UK. To me, the obvious difference between the two was the lack of diversity in the music. They had found their first taste of success with their first ever record, so how did they follow that?
A band who were having a similar experience with this 'League of Artists-getting-big-off-of-their-first-record' at the time was none other than Royal Blood, who have remained relevant by holding off on their releases and improving, adapting and changing with the current landscape. While their second album was still mostly just two guys making a lot of noise, it poked at boundaries that their previous budget wouldn’t have allowed, for example: they now have a keyboard song, some dedicated backing vocalists and a gong that lights on fire. It keeps the same vibe that their audience and radio shows all around the world loved, but took it slightly further. Pretty cool.
If we look back at Pvris their second album is, well, looking back. Like Hallucinations, White Noise was diverse enough to appeal to a wider cut of audiences. It was alternative emo rock but also electronic. In fact, it was one of the first electronic records that really piqued my interest and has definitely shaped my view of the alternative scene.
Use Me consists of eleven tracks; three of which are from the Hallucinations EP (including Hallucinations itself) and two of the pre-release teaser singles, ‘Gimmie A Minute’ and ‘Dead Weight’, which leaves us with six new tracks, and honestly I can’t name any of them. One has an acoustic guitar, another has an acoustic guitar but it’s slightly quieter, and all of them are about sh*tty experiences with love.
The composition of the album is odd as, if you listen to it from start to finish, you get two singles you’ve already heard, then two new songs, and three from the EP that you’ve also already heard. The first two new songs are fine. They’re kinda groovy, kinda emo, but nothing massively stands out about them. By the time I got to the meat of the new music I was bored, and the remaining four tracks really didn’t do much to alleviate this. I liked the bass sound on the final track, ‘Wish You Well’, but again, it just sounded like it could have been one of the songs from the EP. Use Me is simply AWKOH,AWNOH again, but with a few better songs that you could save time skipping to by listening to them on their dedicated EP. It's fine, but it isn't good. It doesn't at any point make the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end or cause me to shiver in awe. It's just fine.
Don’t take my negativity for distaste, Pvris and singer Lynn Gunn are highly iconic in the alternative scene, and I am very much for moving away from the edgier stuff of White Noise to appeal to a wider audience by making their music more accessible, but this isn’t even the case with Use Me. Their older music has enough grit to get on Kerrang!, but enough emotion and groove to be played in the car to my mum. It brought electronic pop and spooky emo together and this is why it was so successful; it looked at the contested border between the fanbases and, instead of taking a side, invited them both out of their trenches for a game of football and a Sainsbury’s meal deal. I didn’t originally start writing this from the perspective of a 2013 Kerrang! TV hipster, but I can’t help but point out that this record doesn’t take strides to appeal to either, and while it likely will in some cases, I doubt it will make waves as big as Pvris’s legacy will, and that is disappointing.
To round this off on a positive, (weirdly) I would like to draw your attention to the recent news that has come out about a certain member of the band. It would seem that, once again, successful male musicians just can’t keep it in their pants, which almost makes the title of the album ironic. I do not understand why people, who’s entire careers are based on public opinion, would risk their income and legacy to pursue something so shallow, let alone damage another person because of it. Obviously, that is easier said than done, but for an artist whose image is about love and inclusivity it really does make me jaded as a listener.
More and more musicians are being outed as awful people, and it’s honestly draining. Lynn Gunn is not one of these people. She has finally bravely stepped up and accepted the mantle of being the sole ‘creative force’ behind Pvris, and despite my comments on the album I think this professional change is for the best, as it may lead to other creative changes in the future and, ultimately, better music for us to enjoy and for her career to be improved by.
Hopefully 2020 will stop laying on this relentless offence and we can get back to enjoying music through speaker cabinets instead of headphones. My friend had a really cute anecdote of being in the line for a Pvris show back in the day for hours, and Gunn ran to the shop to buy them all brownies while they waited outside the venue. You don’t have to buy your fans brownies to be successful, just please don’t be abusive. As for the album, I might come back in two months time and praise it as the best creation on God's given Earth, and if I do I'll be the first person to write about how I was wrong, but until then tell me what you thought? Do you agree with me? Do you want to stab my eyes with pencils for daring to dislike the record? Let me know on my social media, and don't forget to share if you enjoyed the read.