Sybris “You’re Only Confident in Your Insecurities”

I have absolutely no idea how musical trends get started, but I’m not a huge fan of a recent one, in the female indie rock vocal realm. You know what I’m talking about–that alternately delicate and dangerous, is-she-formally-trained or just extraordinarily passionate type of thing that touches upon the best vocal qualities of Nico, Rickie Lee Jones, Hope Sandoval, Roni Spector, and even the Cocteau Twins’ Elisabeth Fraser. The trend that includes, off the top of my head, Leslie Feist, Chan Marshall, Victoria Bergsman from the Concretes, Amber Wells from Black Mountain, Liela Moss from the Duke Spirit, and, for the purposes of this post, Angela Mullenhour from Chicago’s Sybris. On a track like “You’re Only Confident in Your Insecurities” (mp3), she’s able to take what in lesser hands would be not more than a yelp and allow it to embody a range of emotion and feeling mirrored by the swelling and receding music surrounding her.

Buy Sybris’ self-titled record on Flameshovel Records here.