Privilege

Privilege

Fans of Parenthetical Girls who also happen to be guitar devotees may enjoy Privilege more than 2008's orchestral Entanglements. Featuring a series of previously released EPs spanning 2010—2012, this album displays a range of sounds and moods, including emotional bleeding set to dance floor beats à la The Smiths ("Careful Who You Dance With," "A Note to Self"), staggering jangle-inflected rock ("Evelyn McHale"), and guitar- and synth-stabbing aggression ("Young Throats"). Zac Pennington's intense, swooning delivery on many of his tales of sex-positive explorations and damaged psyches ("For All the Final Girls," "Weaknesses") is enough to make you seek out a sunset with a journal and earbuds in hand, and his take on '80s synth balladry ("Curtains") is simply sentimental and nostalgic, in a good way. As in the songs of Xiu Xiu and Rufus Wainwright, Pennington's lyrics are erudite and literate, full of poetry. Boys who grow "into embarrassments of men," visions of "hallowed hips" and "equine thighs," or "welts that swell up, plate-sized" are drawn in sometimes unsettling portraits of unsettled inner lives.

Other Versions

Select a country or region

Africa, Middle East, and India

Asia Pacific

Europe

Latin America and the Caribbean

The United States and Canada