The music video for "Easier" - Irish dark-pop singer-songwriter Cat Turner's first new single in the wake of her debut EP Contrast (March 2018) - charts the emotional ups and downs of a romantic relationship in a fairly routine manner. There are predictable displays of affection and intimacy in public and private settings, punctuated by messy arguments and heated confrontations. The straightforward documentary approach does not quite live up to the unique voice and perspective that Turner presents in the song, which seamlessly blends lust, anger, angst, desperation, co-dependence, and ambivalence in a foreboding-yet-accessible melody.
Backed with somber synths and a driving bassline, Turner plunges directly into an agonized confrontation with her sense of self as one-half of a less-than-ideal relationship. As one might expect, there are familiar hints of a gendered power struggle: 'You're so much easier to hold when I do exactly as I'm told ...Go ahead and talk like you don't love me. Talk like you're above me, although you need me'. Turner is no one-dimensional victim, however - she recognizes the personal neuroses and gendered expectations and that she brings to the table: 'I think you're easier to fuck when we don't actually touch ... I think it'd be easier on us if you could simply suck it up.'
There is no simple resolution or easy solution to be found here, only a state of unresolved ambivalence: 'I wanna get in on you, get in you, wanna get in on you, get in on you/ Give it up if you're not gonna live it up/ Then you gotta give me up cause I'm not for you'. The consistent menace in Turner's vocal delivery hints at darker emotional complexities that lie beneath the surface of her confessions. If relationships could be that much easier, songs like these would not exist.
