TV Girl, an American indie pop band of three, has collaborated with American electropop soloist George Clanton to create not just an album, but an experience. From beginning to end, the listeners are taken on a journey through the highs and lows of their own nostalgia lasting 27 minutes within a seven-track project. The band and Clanton masterfully created a psychedelic, ethereal atmosphere, where themes of nostalgia and longing to manipulate time and space are plentiful, and the most common, yet indescribable emotions frolic.
TV Girl, which consists of lead vocalist Brad Petering, drummer Jason Wyman, and keyboardist Wyatt Harmon, has acquired a cult following from their impressive 21-album discography. Notably, the song “Lover’s Rock” helped skyrocket TV Girl’s rise to popularity, when, in 2022, it became a trending sound on TikTok. Their collaborator, George Clanton, came up in the early vaporwave scene–a microgenre of electronic music—releasing his first album “Further” in 2007.
The best example of the collective’s skillful usage of layering to create a distorted feeling, reminiscent of a surrealist, bright-colored hallucination, is the opening track “Summer 2000 Baby.” This song features lyrics such as “and don’t waste a night inside your bed… / popsicles and ice cream, crashing into limousines” that evoke the feeling of youthful exuberance, yet with a subtle bittersweet undertone. As alluded to, the artists utilize hazy synths and layered, often reverbed, vocals to transport their listeners, and they do this quite well. This has to be the catchiest, most technically complex song on “Fauxllennium.”
In addition, this collaboration is no stranger to exploring some heavier topics, such as regret, longing, addiction, and an indescribable feeling of emotional claustrophobia. TV Girl and Clanton played to their strengths with “Everything Blue,” the second track on “Fauxllennium.” When sung over TV Girl’s specialty dense, 80s-inspired synth instrumentals and reverbed vocals, the lyrics create a hypnotic effect. However, this pensive, hypnagogic atmosphere is soon artfully disrupted by Clanton’s signature soaring electropop instrumentation.
Offering a change of pace from the deep, meditative mood created in “Everything Blue” is the fourth track, “Butterflies,” which features the ethereal Jordana—beloved former collaborator with TV Girl. All in all, this song is certainly unique and an enjoyable listen, as it features a curious combination of soothing vocals, deeply emotional lyrics about the duplicity of relationships and what it means to be free over EDM synth beats. “Butterflies” fits nicely with the musical style of this album and expands on the hazy, melancholic emotions explored in “Everything Blue,” while also shifting the listener to a more chaotic, hedonistic state of mind.
Two of the lesser stand-outs of this album are “Yesterday’s World” and “Fauxllennium.” The former features lyrics like “yesterday’s dreams / seem just so right to me these days / can we go back in time?” that evoke the album’s core concept of longing for a simpler time. This song’s spoken-word introduction gives it a nostalgic, old-timey feel, which slowly fades away as the instrumental builds in volume and tempo, offering a catchy, moving synth-wave instrumental. This song is a great example of the collective’s blending of musical styles, however, the underwhelming ending falls short of the rest of the track.
Likewise, the title track “Fauxllennium” is a fine example of TV Girl playing to their strengths, incorporating hazy vocals over a simple synth instrumental, luring the listener into a hypnagogic state. The lyrics are not anything special, with “na-na-na-na-na-na” being repeated over ten times towards the end of the song. This song fades into the background, which is slightly disappointing for a title track with so much potential. However, the mixing on this song was done well and the melody is quite captivating; it might have done better as an instrumental track, not having seemingly rushed lyrics bring it down.
Overall, “Fauxllennium” is a nice showcase of the collaboration between TV Girl and Clanton, artists who come from significantly different musical backgrounds, but were able to produce an album that blended their styles to create something special. Each song brings new technicality and depth of emotion to the album and demonstrates the command each artist has over their genre, whether it be electropop, vaporwave, neo-psychedelia, indie-pop, or all of the above. This album might not be perfect, but that only adds to the nature of its message: the past might be poignantly flawed, and the present might carry its doubts, but the future is unknown, and it is all up to the listeners to decide what they will do with it.
