Future Perfect [LP]

On her debut EP Future Perfect, British-American songwriter Jenny Hirons sings of childhood visions and capitalist superstructures, of speeding down narrow country lanes and gently disappearing into the ether like a dream fulfilled. Throughout five muted pop tracks recalling Sakamoto & Hosono, Bowie & Eno, Hirons conjures pop fantasy and confronts reality with bright-eyed steeliness. The title Future Perfect refers to actions which shall be completed. Having absorbed the musical debut of Jenny Hirons, the attentive listener will have found themselves with a feeling of time well spent. Lyrical analysis being entirely optional - upon inspection a multiprismatic picture of life viewed from all points in time emerges - a child imagines adulthood, an adult returns to autonomy, a voice from another place looks back on a child's fantasies of the future. The effect of these songs is anything but ponderous, however. Hope, aspiration, overcoming are the takeaways, and musically the tone is a reflection of the artist herself - wry, cerebral, poised, entirely charming. Hirons cites Astor Piazolla, the Beach Boys, Elliot Smith, Deerhoof, and Rachmaninoff as musical influences. (For those who don't know, Piazolla is an accordionist.) Hirons is also a deeply accomplished visual artist and designer. The product of several years of tinkering, Future Perfect is also a breakup record, an unemployment record, an uncertain future record. Having now made it out into the world, Hirons looks back to a time when "music was the economy of our hearts", and forward to a future allowed to shape itself however it may be, "carried home in all directions."