Slow Fiction’s new single “When,” out now through Speedy Wunderground, plunges headlong into a chaotic spiral of emotional reckoning, wrapping vulnerability in fuzzed-out guitars and fire-lit vocals.
From the first punch of seismic drums and that off-kilter, lurching bassline, “When” feels like a desolation but not one you mind descending into. It’s a song that walks the line between a controlled collapse and a cathartic howl, with the band’s frontwoman, Julia Vassallo, steering the fall with a kind of raw vocal heat that’s hard to lock eyes with. Imagine early Pixies wrenched into a dark dreamscape of poetic self-interrogation.
“When” is the type of song that examines the cracks in the wall and chooses to paint ’em neon instead of cover ’em up. Vassallo’s lyrics come from when the world doesn’t deliver what you hoped when the crowd doesn’t clap when love doesn’t stick, and then suddenly, you’re tumbling.
The band holds it tight, pointed, and effective. Those two and a half minutes contain a lot of tension, release, and that bittersweet ache of trying to nail down how it all went wrong or maybe just how to start clawing back up. With “When,” Slow Fiction has provided a loud, glorious, beautifully deranged reminder that falling apart can feel liberating.
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