A Danger To Ourselves

Lucrecia Dalts acclaimed 2022 effort !Ay! was a science fiction concept album about an alien visiting Earth, set to avant-garde mutations of bolero, merengue, and space-age exotica. Shes continued exploring otherworldly concepts with her installation work as well as her scores for film and television, including the HBO series The Baby and the psychological horror Rabbit Trap. A Danger to Ourselves, her 2025 studio album, moves away from fictional narratives and outlandish concepts, instead basing the bilingual lyrics on personal experiences. The arrangements, often filled with close-miked acoustic instruments and clanging percussion, feel as intimate as the lyrics, yet theyre also disarmingly trippy, with electronic effects and processing twisting the sounds into unfamiliar and unconventional textures. Opener "cosa rara" has a slithering bassline and rhythms provided by hand drums and clapping hands, with burst of distortion knocking things from the hinges, and a dramatic crashing sound segueing into a slow, dubby section accompanied by a brief spoken verse from David Sylvian, who helps transform the song into a surreal noir atmosphere. The bewildering "caes," featuring Camille Mandoki, features whooshing synths, brash snare rolls, and a sort of abstract tango rhythm. Songs that would otherwise seem more ballad-like, such as the string-laden "hasta el final," are made more unnerving by cinematic sound design, filled with unanticipated bursts and effects that sharpen the percussion like knives. Juana Molina joins Dalt on the low-key and swampy yet magical "the common reader." The final song, "covenstead blues," opens with the line "May I blow you up, malignant goddess?," and expresses a disturbing sensation of being slowly pulled apart. A Danger to Ourselves is a unique sonic environment that actually becomes stranger as one spends more time inside of it. ~ Paul Simpson