by Anna Solomon (@chateau.fiasco)
Al Harper has been a part of the San Francisco DIY scene for years now, often working with noisy lo-fi projects like Tony Jay and Eternal Drag. With her 2021 solo debut, Promises I Kept, she successfully brought this indie sensibility into more ornate folk-rock arrangements that recall Fleetwood Mac and Eagles. She’s set to follow it up with The Analemma Observation League, due out February 23 via Take a Turn Records, and she just shared the second single “Plaster of Paris.”
“Plaster of Paris” is a track that starts sunny and only gets sunnier, but the opening measures might make you think it’s simpler than it really is. Not long after establishing the simple, driving rhythm section, Harper’s voice glides in among sparkling synths that fill out the harmony and quickly elevate the track into indie pop elegance. Depending on how you count it, the song has up to seven sections that are all catchy enough to be the chorus, but none more than Harper’s sweetly harmonized hook of “no pictures, no pictures please.” Bright guitar and bass hooks counter her vocal melodies all throughout the track, while the rhythm guitar and drums keep pushing up against the song in a way that’s forceful, but never to the point of detracting from the airiness of the tune.
About the track, Al Harper says:
"Musically ‘Plaster of Paris’ is my attempt at being punk. I thought of the intro guitar line while my husband was vacuuming the house. The lyrics are all based on actual events that I won't get into, except that having my picture taken makes me extremely uncomfortable, and I thought it was funny to sing the phrase "no pictures please" literally instead of in the sense of like running from the paparazzi. I feel like the sacred moments in our lives are ruined by the modern obsession with documenting them and the self-consciousness that accompanies that, except then there's the problem of misremembering or forgetting them completely. I have a sense that I only fully remember maybe 4 days worth of my entire life because I'm such a pathetic documentarian. So for the video I wanted to get shots of reverent and long-lasting artforms like sculpture and architecture juxtaposed with the fleeting thrills we get from new feelings and quick photos. The video was filmed on a handycam in one day mostly in Oakland on the Bay Bridge, a BART train, Morcom Rose Garden, Chapel of the Chimes, Mountain View Cemetery, and in my living room by me and my husband Craig Barclift, and edited by Simon Linsteadt."