TRACK: Melody’s Echo Chamber – ‘Breathe In, Breathe Out’

After a long break since her mesmerising self-titled debut album, Melody’s Echo Chamber, the psychedelic goddess left us with the oh-so important question on our minds, can she do it again? It was never a secret that Melody Prochet’s work in 2012 was promptly elevated by the likes of Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker, but Melody’s musical response could not have been more appropriate regarding any doubts that may have lingered throughout the past six years. ‘Breathe In, Breathe Out’ makes no attempt to clone or replicate her previous work, its drive seeks to break convention and is yet inevitably reminiscent of the original Melody we wholeheartedly fell in love with from the beginning.

This time last year, the French songwriter released the distinctive single that would be a part of her sophomore album Bon Voyage, titled ‘Cross my Heart’. The track glittered floods of surging psychedelia in its rawest form, but since then we have been left to wait with anticipation whilst the rest of the album has been in the process. Bon Voyage is due to come out on June 15 via Domino, featuring collaborations with members from Pond, Dungen and The Amazing. By the sounds of things so far, the upcoming album has echoes of Melody’s traditional sound, intertwined with strange disruptions of instrumental that cascade into tremendous clashes of genre. Messy but fearless, the future of Melody’s Echo Chamber is going to be durable and unforgettable, bound to leave a mark on any of those who take a listen.

A familiar component within ‘Breathe In, Breathe Out’ is that the track’s confident flavour derives from the dominating guitar which drives the direction of the song. Juxtaposing against this are Melody’s soft but euphoric vocals which effortlessly float alongside the gritty bass notes. The track unapologetically takes off on its own tangents; abrupt pauses, sudden key changes and otherworldly sounds are the key definers within this song. The lack of form and enchanted drifts characterise the forests of Solna, Sweden, where Melody was able to write the music free from any mundane distraction.

The outcome of the track embodies this environment and is both bewildering and powerfully mysterious. Not to mention, the music video is just as wonderfully confusing as the track. The disjointed fragments are somehow blended in her mythical and imaginative world, and we are able to visualise this through the cartoon kaleidoscope the video offers us.

‘Breathe In, Breathe Out’ is like a dance in a realm of curiosity and magic. It doesn’t make sense because it doesn’t aim to do that. It doesn’t have to. We are offered a world to discover, not to recognise.