- Playful, hyperpop-leaning electronics at the intersection of fantasy and heartbreak.
- It can feel daunting to try and keep up with Mari Maurice's seemingly-constant output as more eaze. The Austin, Texas-based artist churns out experimental music at a rapid clip (when she isn't busy touring with indie rock acts like Lomelda and Alexalone). Her latest EP, spiraling, arrives just a few weeks after the heartbroken full length oneiric, which embraced sprawling synth scapes, neoclassical instrumentation and angelic vocal swells. This more succinct endeavor, out on New York-Ohio weirdo imprint Orange Milk, leans back into the hyperpop tropes she explored with Claire Rousay on January's Never Stop Texting Me. Billed as a companion piece to oneiric—which was inspired by dreams, heartbreak, and ontology—spiraling ponders the opposite: what happens when unsaid, painful romantic truths manifest themselves in the corporeal world.
This new EP presents the most vigorous, direct side of Maurice's work we've heard yet. She's no stranger to collaboration, and a number of guest vocalists appear on spiraling (Maurice trades verses with artists including diana starshine, recovery girl, and Pamela Santiago). "conflict styles" underlines its apathetic hook with fluorescent chords, and "read receipts" contrasts plinking chords with a disorienting synth lead. The most quintessentially more eaze moment comes with the droning shimmer of the closing track "eat slowly," which feels indebted to oneric's sonic expansiveness. As a whole, though, the arrangements are crunchy and lighthearted. It sounds like Maurice is genuinely having fun constructing more bubbly music in spite of the sometimes heavy subject matter.
As with Never Stop Texting Me, there's something about spiraling that comes across as endearingly tongue-in-cheek, even though it comes from a place of anguish and frustration. "I wouldn't say that I didn't mean it / Trying to redeem yourself on the weekends / Isn't going to save a ship that's sinking," she glumly sings in the EP's opening lines, her voice shredded into neon ribbons by an AutoTune effect, the kind of playful touch that keeps Maurice's dense discography so captivating. Whether her work brings to mind Karlheinz Stockhausen or 100 gecs, it's all united by a spirit of unspoken approachability.
Tracklist01. read receipts
02. spiraling feat. diana starshine
03. conflict styles feat. recovery girl
04. repurposed fumes
05. primordial feat. Pamela Santiago
06. eat slowly