ALBUM OF THE DAY
recovery girl, “recovery girl”
By Ed Blair · May 01, 2020 Merch for this release:
Cassette

Galen Tipton’s latest release opens with a question familiar to any arcade vet: ”Do you wish to continue?” The Ohio producer flips the sentiment, turning a mocking video game death knell into a joyous welcome to their new project, recovery girl (so named for a character from beloved anime series My Hero Academia). Whereas Tipton’s previous full-length, 2018’s nightbath, was a collaborative-heavy synthesis of the maximalism of PC Music and the joyful ambience of Japanese post-footwork, recovery girl’s eponymous debut is a singular work situated center stage. Originally released in January as an EP and freshly reissued in LP form by Orange Milkthe expanded edition includes February’s gross/scratch EP and seven remixes—it’s a euphoric batch of glitched-out pop songs that funnels the messy rush of catharsis into the giddy aggression of the dancefloor. 

Tipton works their transmogrifying magic in “that girl is my world(you transphobic piece of shit),” a hyperactive, gender-fluid anthem barbed with a whispered vow of vengeance: “I’ll be your doom.” The title track retains that thorough-line of triumph, with Tipton exulting in their ability to “handle anything at all,” before a maniacal laugh sample ushers in a factory-collapsing dance break. That these power moves are contrasted with occasional periods of calm—namely the interlude “let’s go bitch,” which echoes the claustrophobic and alien breakdowns SOPHIE created for Charli XCX’s Vroom Vroom EP—that further amplify the chaos, while simultaneously exposing the album’s emotional depth. Cuts like “numbing gel,” a percussive-heavy club banger that alternates “let’s fuck” samples with intimate, heavily-processed confessions, conjures an environment slick with sweat, but also unrealized longing. As recovery girl, Tipton has created pop music for dancing back from the cliff’s edge, taking despair and anger and fear and turning it into a healing potion, an extra life when one is most needed.

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