The music of Nicole Yun on Paper Suit leaps all over genres. The tunes on this solo debut from the singer of Eternal Summers are effortlessly catchy indie-pop stormers, some chiming and some more contemplative. What's here on this record, out on Friday via Kanine Records, is uniformly great, the stylish tunes throughout this album recalling the best work from artists as diverse as Blake Babies, Belly, and Unrest.
If opener "Tommie" is a bit space-y, a flash of Broadcast peeking through as a point of inspiration, the soaring "Supernatural Babe" is even better, think an odd mix of Juliana Hatfield and The Boo Radleys. Yun, unafraid to wear her influences on her sleeve, makes all of this work so easily that a listener can be forgiven for thinking of the earlier acts that perhaps gave Nicole the spark for some of this. If "And After All" and "Maximum" sound a bit like the best stuff from the peak years of The Cardigans, a more languid number, like "Destroy Me", takes more chances. On this one, Yun crafts a thoroughly-modern sort of American indie-pop, think a Yo La Tengo number performed by a Britpop band. This is spacious music, and it's also fairly concise, Nicole taking risks but doing so within the strict confines of the form. The overall approach on Paper Suit works spectacularly, such that every cut on the short album feels like a big college radio hit from some perfect past, collected here for the future. And given that, for fans of the indie-pop genre, it's safe to say that this whole record is one that's easy to love.
Paper Suit is out on Friday via Kanine Records.
More details on Nicole Yun via her official Facebook page.
[Photo: Jeff Hofmann]