This is a review that should’ve been written at least a year and a half ago. Better late than never, eh? There couldn’t have been a more perfect time for Sigrid to breakout with ‘Don’t Kill My Vibe’ two years ago, but to say it “felt like yesterday” would be us lying through our teeth. People have been lining-up for a Sigrid debut since the end of 2017, a pinnacle moment in the 22-year-old’s career by at that point she’d reached summits with ‘Strangers’ and got tipped with first place on BBC Music’s Sound of 2018.
The promising debut has howbeit shipped itself over and as expected, it’s essentially a greatest hits record. Sigrid thwacks us one with ‘Sucker Punch’, a playful opener in which the beloved Norwegian lady lays all her cards on the table, but then again the gal is brutally honest in all her music – that striking Virgo energy is echoing.
This energy seamlessly flows into ‘Mine Right Now’, a virgin moment on the record in which Sigrid brings light to the point in a relationship where it isn’t exactly an all-in thing just yet; she’s living life free spirited and taking each day as it comes.
Sigrid does this mesmerising rap-like bridge for both ‘Strangers’ and ‘Don’t Feel Like Crying’ that honestly peaks the album and although it doesn’t happen anywhere else on the record it’s nice that these two come one after the other, allowing them to be fully embraced side by side.
‘In Vain’ acts as a shining moment on the album. We all knew Sigrid was a hitmaker but now we possess the proof she is a vocalist. Self-admitting it was one of the harder tracks to get the right production for, she opts for a more straight-forward approach with just her band backing her belts for four minutes straight. I’m having visions of the “give it up baby,” lyric live and yup, that’s going to be a lighter in the air moment and you know what? She deserves it.
Whilst most of the record centres around love (and why wouldn’t it, Sigrid is fresh into her 20s and mid self-discovery) I must praise her for ‘Business Dinners' and her inability to keep quiet when it comes to executive bullshit musicians–and artists of all kinds–put up with. “You just want me to be pictures, numbers, figures, I’m just tryna be me…” she sings amid an orchestra of childlike chanting. We enter a playground atmosphere with this belter, a nursery rhyme soundscape made to sound like she’s not playing by the rules.
Sigrid’s raw vocal delivery peaks with familiar face ‘Dynamite’, closing the album on a purring note and gosh what a journey we’ve been on. In between all the sucker punching and vibes refusing to be killed you start to recognise the type of person Sigrid is; a dominating mistress you can’t quite seem to take your eyes off of. Sucker Punch is vibrant and fluorescent, it’s the album everyone was expecting but nonetheless an album that can be enjoyed, and boy does it quite literally pack a punch.
Sucker Punch is released on 8 March 2019 via Island Records.
