Grimes -- Visions

8/10

You ever wonder what would happen if someone combined those songs from the end of anime movies with the music from a really seedy, late-night 80's dance club?
No you didn't, you liar, and that was a rhetorical question, and also I can't hear you because I'm your computer monitor.
Anyway, apparently someone from Canada named Claire Boucher decided she did wonder what that sounded like and for some reason, called herself Grimes and started making music that sounded that way. Also, she apparently likes Mariah Carey a lot, so there's that element, too. So imagine Mariah Carey has a lisp, sings like a chipmunk, and combines anime closing songs with weird 80's dance music, and that's basically Grimes' third album, Visions, in a nut shell. That this album works at all must have something to do with Boucher's sensibilities, because it really, really shouldn't.
Visions can be divided into two unequal sections. Awesome weird, which actually comprises the majority of the album, and weird, weird, which only encompasses small moments of the album. Basically, the chipmunk sounds like it's on way too much acid for those overly strange spaces. I have no idea why I keep saying "basically" because there is nothing basic about this crazy music, which is certainly an acquired taste. So in the interest of saying "basically" one more time without quotation marks, Visions is basically a very good album when Boucher is balancing her weirdness with her keen ear for a good beat and melody, but in a few fleeting moments, not so good when it sounds like Boucher is trying to scare away her neighbors.
For an example of awesome weird, check out these two videos. The first, for "Genesis," features Boucher and a bunch of weirdos acting weird. They basically look like anime characters who accidentally wandered into the real world. I mean, she's wearing a Sailor Moon costume. The second features more male nudity than I would usually call awesome, but Boucher seems so good-natured as she bounces around in her awful sweaters and pink hair, smacking her gum, that it's all good.
It's all good.

2012 4AD/Arbutus
1. Infinite ♡ Without Fulfillment 1:36
2. Genesis 4:15
3. Oblivion 4:12
4. Eight 1:48
5. Circumambient 3:43
6. Vowels = Space and Time 4:21
7. Visiting Statue 1:59
8. Be a Body (侘寂) 4:20
9. Colour of Moonlight (Antiochus) (featuring Doldrums) 4:00
10. Symphonia IX (My Wait Is U) 4:53
11. Nightmusic (featuring Majical Cloudz) 5:03
12. Skin 6:09
13. Know the Way (Outro) 1:45