Clairo – Immunity

Viral bedroom pop sensation Clairo crosses over to indie with soul-bearing lyrics and great production with Vampire Weekend-alum Rostam. 7/10

Immunity opens with “Alewife,” a hymnal, autumnal reflection on youthful suicidality. Clairo sings a bleary-eyed confessional over gentle, reverb-soaked piano, lightly strummed guitars, and soaring background vocals. A baroque synthesizer flourish adds energy and wonder to the quiet and emotional opener, serving as an excellent primer for the rest of the album. In “Impossible,” Rostam cranks out a few harpsicord overtures to draw interest to an otherwise flat track. However fleeting, the beat drops for Clairo to deliver intimate melodies over sparse accompaniment: “And I know we’re not the same as we were/ Used to be falling hard, but now it just hurts.”

In “Closer to You,” Clairo and Rostam meet in the middle, embracing trap percussion, Autotuned close harmony vocals, and mellow synth bass. The track is an album highlight, balancing Clairo’s sentimentality and penchant for minimalism. This continues into the track “North,” favoring more vocal and global effects to color a song depicting a failed relationship as a call for change.

Danielle Haim lays down a cool drumline on the single “Bags,” returning the listener to understated-strumming-against-baroque-interjections one might expect from Modern Vampires. Pleasant and inoffensive, it’s an instant Starbucks classic that doesn’t move the needle nearly as much as the following track, “Softly.” Soulful guitars filter in and out while a slick and smooth bass groove drives a song about intimate exploration home. Sexy, yet innocent; yearning for safety but willing to take a chance — “Softly” should not be missed.

“Sofia” opens with its tinny Strokes-like guitar strums and sweet chorus melody, touching on similar themes as “Impossible” and “Softly.” It progresses like a standard indie rock tune, with a surprise visit from looping and rounding vocals in the outro. Next up, “White Flag,” has moments reminiscent of Bon Iver’s self-titled, but fails to impress beyond its control of atmosphere. Pleading “Feel Something” pairs dubby bass with a plaintive vocal conveying the tail end of a messy break up. “Sinking” follows a similar emotional pallet, borrowing guitars from “Softly” with a hypnotic beat.

The album concludes with an epic ballad, “I Wouldn’t Ask You.” The quiet reflection on undeserved compassion becomes a mantra chanted by a children’s choir, which ties together moments on the album where the same choir is sampled. Soft, twinkling pianos flip into a dreamy psych-R&B final section that becomes a melting pot of the record’s prior offerings. The cerebral hymn closes the album with the feeling that, very occasionally, virality begets execution.

At twenty, Claire Cottrill has planted a budding musical career built on the ever fickle playlist culture which dominates contemporary listening. Immunity has moments of great, mellow triumph which point not only to great potential, but to an ear for execution. Multiple listens identify standouts and skip-overs on the record, but, as a whole, Immunity deserves respect for its melding of lo-fi R&B, indie rock, and bedroom pop into a pleasant, downtempo musical experience.