I picked a record by an artist called Cindy Lee, What’s Tonight To Eternity. It offered a beautiful escape to this year. It allowed me to get away from the here and now, not an easy feat these days.
When I first heard it, it was early days of the pandemic - either February or March - and it did not connect. I found myself unprepared for how unsettling and harsh it was. I was not in the right headspace at all and only really started to enjoy it after several repeat listens with headphones. What's Tonight to Eternity is not background music to be enjoyed with a latte. You really need to give your undivided attention to it and let its haunting atmosphere take over. Underneath the harsh exterior is truly beautiful music centered around Cindy Lee's ghostly falsetto.
The songwriting has a timeless feel and there is a smorgasbord of sounds/eras being mixed together — I get Bernard Hermann Taxi Driver vibes, I get Karen Carpenter vibes. The second track, “I Want You To Suffer,” sounds to me like The Supremes singing with a band of power tools in a tin shed. Other singers that came to mind were Little Ann’s “Deep Shadows” or Francoise Hardy; then the next song will sound like Tangerine Dream. It’s a cinematic journey with lots of twists and turns that I enjoy more and more each listen. It's a trip.
Cindy Lee’s What’s Tonight To Eternity is out now, as is METZ’s Atlas Vending.
As told to Annie Fell.
(Photo Credit: left, Norman Wong)
