Louisahhh - The Practice Of Freedom

  • A deeply personal and occasionally confrontational techno album.
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  • Louisahhh Pilot has spent her entire musical career trying to find herself. She's spoken at length about her recovery from addiction, an ongoing process. In the world of nightlife, surrounded by drugs and alcohol, remaining sober is a practice that never ends. More recently she discovered BDSM, identifying as a "feminist submissive" and finding worth and value in that role. The title of her debut album, The Practice Of Freedom, feels like a nod to both practices. To Pilot, freedom means the ability to assert yourself and your desires, to create your identity. It's not only a state of being but a right that must be actively maintained, even fought for. This idea forms the backbone of the LP, a fierce and snarling techno album shot through with themes of lust, love, solidarity and righteous anger. Pilot's work has always carried a whiff of EBM—the spoken word vocals, the rippling sequencer lines—and this influence comes to the fore on The Practice Of Freedom. She adopts a sloganeering presence not unlike Douglas McCarthy of Nitzer Ebb, with most lyrics delivered as barked couplets, some more convincing than others. ("No pressure / No diamond" is one of the LP's most memorable choruses.) Fittingly, she delivers them over a variety of EBM techno beats, from the thwacking distortion of "Corrupter" (and its crushing half-time breakdown) to the alt-rock thrust of "Chaos," whose mechanistic guitar riffs indulge her childhood love of Nine Inch Nails. The best parts of The Practice Of Freedom come when Pilot breaks from the techno mould, like on "Chaos." Or "Master," a vulnerable song with heartfelt guitar leads and lyrics about the ups and downs of a BDSM relationship, and the freedom found in submissive role-playing. On the other hand, there's "Numb, Undone," a scorched earth techno workout that Pilot says she lost her voice recording. It's mean, unrelenting and a little sexy. Songs like "Master" reflect the mindset that makes The Practice Of Freedom a fresh start. Pilot says she found a "new sense of empowerment, connection, and capacity for love" after discovering BDSM in 2016, and has since learned to accept and indulge her "base desires" without guilt. One particularly memorable motto Pilot has bandied about is "sin is not being true to yourself," and the album is appropriately earnest, to the point that even some of the clunkier lyrics are still endearing. From defiant expressions of sexuality to torch songs to the cathartic elegy "Not Dead," each track tackles a different subject with candor and straightforward words. "Not Dead" is another major standout on the album. It's structured more like a pop song, with twitchy drum programming that imitates the cliff's edge feeling of sadness, acceptance and resignation that comes with grieving the loss of a loved one. "I am lying here in wait / To feel your cracks when you are breaking," she says, before launching into the chorus: "Death is a myth." Like so much of the album, "Not Dead" finds strength in defiance of the oppressive world around it.
  • Tracklist
      01. Love Is A Punk 02. Like A Shot 03. Chaos 04. Ferocious (Contained) 05. Master 06. No Pressure 07. Not Dead 08. Numb, Undone 09. Corrupter 10. A Hard No 11. Hunter Wolf
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