Frankie Cosmos – Inner World Peace (LP, Sub Pop)

Several things happened before a warm day when I met the four members of Frankie Cosmos in a Brooklyn studio to begin making their album. Greta Kline spent a few years living with her family and writing a mere 100 songs turning her empathy anywhere from the navel to the moon rendering it all warm close and reflexively humorous. In music everyone loves a teen sensation but Kline has never been more fascinating than now a decade into being one of the most prolific songwriters of her generation. She s lodged in my mind amongst authors other observational alchemists like Rachel Cusk or Sheila Heti but she s funnier which is a charm endemic to musicians. Meanwhile Frankie Cosmos a rare dwindling democratic entity called a band had been on pandemic hiatus with no idea if they d continue. In the openness of that uncertainty they met up planning to hang out and play music together for the first time in nearly 500 days. There whittling down the multitude of music to work with they created Inner World Peace a collection of Greta s songs changed and sculpted by their time together. While Kline s musical taste at the time was leaning toward aughts indie rock she d loved as a teenager keyboardist Lauren Martin and drummer Luke Pyenson cite droning meditation repetition clarity and intentionality as well as 70s folk and pop as a reference for how they approached their parts. Bassist/guitarist Alex Bailey says that at the time he referred to it as their ambient or psych album. Somewhere between those textural elements and Kline s penchant for concise pop Inner World Peace finds it s balance. The first order of business upon setting up camp in Brooklyn s Figure 8 studios was to project giant colorful slides the band had made for each track. Co-producing with Nate Mendelsohn my Shitty Hits Recording partner we aimed for FC s aesthetic idiosyncrasies to shine. The mood board for Magnetic Personality has a neon green and black checkerboard a screen capture of the game Street Fighter with K.O. in fat red letters and a cover of Mad Magazine that says Spy Vs. Spy! The Top Secret Files. On tracks like F.O.O.F. (Freak Out On Friday) Fragments and Aftershook the group are at their most psychedelic and playful interjecting fuzz solos bits of percussion and other sonically adventurous ear candy. An internal logic strengthens everything and in their proggiest moments Frankie Cosmos are simply a one-take band who don t miss. When on Inner World Peace they sound wildly freshly different it may just be that they re coming deeper into their own.Inner World Peace excels in passing on the emotions it holds. When in the towering Empty Head Kline sings of wanting to let thoughts slide away her voice is buoyed on a bed of synths and harmonium as tranquility abounds. When her thoughts become hurried and full of desire so does the band and she leaps from word to word as if unable to contain them all. As a group they carry it all deftly and with constant regard for Kline s point of view.Says Greta To me the album is about perception. It s about the question of who am I? and whether or not the answer matters. It s about quantum time the possibilities of invisible worlds. The album is about finding myself floating in a new context. A teenager again living with my parents. An adult choosing to live with my family in an act of love. Time propelled us forward aged us and also froze. If you don Album Tracks 1. Abigail 2. Aftershook 3. Fruit Stand 4. Magnetic Personality 5. Wayne 6. Sky Magnet 7. A Work Call 8. Empty Head 9. Fragments 10. Prolonging Babyhood 11. One Year Stand 12. F.O.O.F 13. Street View 14. Spare the Guitar 15. Heed the Call.