If I were to describe Emma Louise’s voice to you, you would probably imagine a sound completely different to the one she makes. The purity and strength of her voice is equal to that of Ellie Goulding or Birdy, but the way she uses it is quite different. Emma Louise first caught my attention in 2013 when Wankelmut made a remix of her song, My Head is a Jungle, pulled from the Vs Head Vs Heart album.
Talk Baby Talk, released in 2016, is an edgier, electronically driven song that is hard to predict and satisfying to listen to. Emma Louise manages to create something that is relevant to the current mainstream pop and dance music market, without straying from the interesting content and unique structure that characterise her previous work.
While I may have come off as somewhat dismissive of the mainstream pop scene in previous articles, I actually have a great appreciation for well-made pop music. However, it is difficult to refute the fact that we are talking about an over saturated market. While some people may think this is a bad thing, I actually beg to differ. In the internet age, it’s incredibly easy to release music. This means that there is really a lot of stuff out there that’s discoverable. This would have been difficult to imagine before the new millennium hit. Don’t get me wrong, I still think there’s tons of trash out there, but the increased accessibility also means that there is room for artists like Emma Louise to become better known.
When you’re listening to Talk Baby Talk, it’s clear that Emma Louise has exposed herself to all manner of music being released at the moment. She takes the best of what’s current and creates something unique, fresh and relevant. One of the great things in the current market is the fact that strange, electronic sounds are becoming more and more accessible. As I said in my article about Boys Noize’s remix of Feist’s My Moon My Man, there’s no better entry into underground electronic music than a fusion of pretty vocal sounds and gritty electronic textures.
Innovation is exciting and that is the quality that sets Emma Louise’s Talk Baby Talk apart from the rest. We have a flooded market to thank for opening our minds to new, interesting tracks like this one, and for that I can forgive it for the worst of sins.
