by Carolina Simionato (@smntcarolina)
Hopefully it’s sunny while you’re reading this, or it is about to be, or it will be sunny when you make the little sage decision of listening to Olivia’s World’s EP Tuff 2B Tender, out on Lost Sound Tapes. I'm sure it can be appreciated in many different ways, but the optimal condition might be under a blue sky on a summery day, fluffy clouds strolling along, the wind blowing through the bright riffs and chords with a nib of nostalgia.
The Australian and previously Canada-based band — here with Alicia Rezende (vocals, guitar), Tina Agic (guitar), Joe Saxby (bass), and Ben Napier (percussion) — is, as often as not, balancing sweet melodies with rougher guitars, a contrast well expressed by the EP’s title and cover featuring bright yellow and deep blue shapes.
“Grassland,” the EP’s balmier and synthier track, manifests such blending polarity with its last words: “what kind of sage are you?/I’m a perennial blue.” The lyrics are themselves a special delight, absurd and poetic and hefty all at once. Rezende’s voice recapitulates a certain twee, indie pop sound that is nevertheless very much her own. Playful in melody, words, and delivery, it maintains honesty while carrying the song ever higher — both in a pitch and an ethereal sense. “Social Seagull,” which might just become the hit of many a summer, once again simultaneously dances around both the cuteness of imagery such as “tiny crown/fit for tiny mice” and the harshness of being alive — here the main theme is being so far away from the friends you are missing; in Rezende's (and mine) case, many thousands of kilometers away.
Tuff 2B Tender is dulcetly punchy, but punchy nevertheless. Here's an EP where nothing seems to be missing — even when many other things are amiss, including the very real feelings which often generate songs. It’s sunshine-through-thick-clouds music to remember that we are in this world, but also sometimes dreamily drift away and while still being reminded, forget; through tough and tender.