Dazzling and dynamic, charming and charged, Letting Up Despite Great Faults’ “She Spins” is an undeniably radiant dream pop delight.
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“She Spins” – Letting Up Despite Great Faults
I think when you search deeper, and you’ve had more life experiences, there is maturation from which to pull.
Dazzling and dynamic, charming and charged, “She Spins” is an undeniably radiant dream pop delight: It’s the kind of immersive outpouring of a song that whisks listeners away from the day to day, plunging us into an ethereal, electric daydream. A standout on Letting Up Despite Great Faults’ recently-released (and long awaited) fourth album, it’s the kind of upbeat shoegaze reverie that envelops the ears as it does the heart.
Can’t you see the ice beneath
Starts to bend, when you condescend the way I try
She turns, she turns everything upside down
With you, I feel like I’m skating on thin ice
Will it bother you if I don’t want to hide?
Once upon a time we might have called “positive shoegaze” an oxymoron, but Austin’s Letting Up Despite Great Faults are helping to change that narrative. Released in March, the band’s fourth album IV not only marks a special return after eight long years, but it also pushes the bounds of what dream pop looks like and how shoegaze may sound. Currently consisting of Mike Lee (vocals, guitar), Kent Zambrana (bass), Annah Fisette (vocals, guitar), and Daniel Schmidt (drums), Letting Up Despite Great Faults have undergone their own considerable transformation over the past decade and change since their debut; their new LP delves into the depths of personal growth and life’s movement, with songs of loss, nostalgia, renewal, and hope giving IV a particularly substantial, visceral depth.
“She Spins” is a prime example of frontman and principal songwriter Mike Lee’s achingly honest, no-stone-unturned attitude at this juncture. Lee dives into his own psyche as he tries to understand his own reactions to the world around him: Why he feels a certain way, how others’ actions and behaviors impact him, and what that means for him.
Can’t you see the ice beneath me starts to bend?
When you defend the way he tries
Will you use the same words to hurt me again?
She says she only spins for you
Do you remember all the words you used to hurt me?
Are you giving me a test?
To make me a mess?
“‘She Spins’ is a song about that subtle jealousy you get when someone gives something to another in a way they’ve never given to you, or maybe something you’ve never seen them do that completely surprises you because you thought you knew everything about this person,” Lee explains. “But it’s feeling that and then realizing it’s sort of your fault for not realizing that or welcoming a space for that person to open up in that way and trying to figure out if you change for that person, or you let that person have that space because that might be better for them.”
She spins, she spins like she’s waiting for my doom; I feel like I’m skating on thin ice with you…
Lee acknowledges that IV may very well be the band’s most intentional, thought-out, and cerebral effort yet. “I don’t want to say IV is necessarily darker than our previous work, but I think there’s more of an awareness of mortality, the mortality of everyone else. You reflect more about the people you love, why you love, how long you love.” The direct result of considerable explorations into the self, “She Spins” is an alluring showcase of this intense introspection at work in a constructive manner.
I’m ready to hear what you whispered in his ear
I’ll hold my breath until the conversation’s clear
I’m falling again, I’m falling upside down again
She spins, she spins even when I’m in the room
She spins, she spins like she’s waiting for my doom
I feel like I’m skating on thin ice
I feel like I’m skating on thin ice with you
The band’s newly-released music video adds to the excitement of an already enchanting song: “We worked with our favorite director Vanessa Pla for our favourite song off the album, ‘She Spins,’” Lee notes. “Shot entirely on 16 mm, Vanessa helped us capture the hazy and fleeting feelings we all experience when it comes to love and jealousy and how we frame them in our memories.”
“She Spins” is as richly colorful a music video is as it is a song, filled with warm hues and glowing guitars that together bring us closer to the band and closer to ourselves. Get lost (and found) in Letting Up Despite Great Faults’ soaring sonic wonder, and be sure to give IV a listen wherever you get your music.
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“She Spins” – Letting Up Despite Great Faults
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? © Elysia Perkins
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