TRACK: Douglas – ‘Cigarettes’: euphoric, blurry synthpop futurism


Douglas, photographed by Alexander Brown

AMY DOUGLAS WHITE is a Los Angelino by adoption, by way of Madrid, where she was raised the child of American parents.

She’s got form in the music biz, serving for three years behind the keyboard in LA’s suitably trippy West Indian Girl and contributing background vocals to M83’s seminal single, “Midnight City”.

She’s stepped out on her own path now as Douglas, to explore the wayward avenues of experimental ambient synth-pop; her debut album, Ashes, will be out on April 2nd on Gentle Beast Productions.

… all of which she’s announcing here today with a lead single, “Cigarettes”, which you can hear below. You’ll find it an euphoric, leftfield pop tune, big on the torchsong vocal hooks, but instrumentally blurry and rapturous and synthy in a wholly psychedelic way.

It depicts, we’re told, “a woman grappling with a crumbling relationship and finally realizing that her happiness lies in her freedom. The tune features guitar dreaminess from Jonathan Bates, of Big Black Delta; bass from Justin Meldal-Johnsen, who’s worked with Nine Inch Nails and Beck, and Kris Persson on drums.

Straddling two linguistic and cultural worlds, the American and the Spanish, Amy chooses to sing in both languages in the album, which, on a sneak preview, pulses, dreams, boogies more than a little; elegises, drawing on Ulrich Schnauss, Burial, and techno for her palette.

Connect with Douglas at her website and on Bandcamp, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

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