In the foreword to their book Surviving Autocracy, the journalist M. Gessen cites philosopher Hannah Arendt’s writing on totalitarianism. In order to succeed, Arendt theorizes, autocratic leaders need a population that’s two things: gullible and cynical. Fighting against fascism, then, requires rigor, skepticism, a belief in human dignity.
Perhaps this is not the source material you’d expect to have inspired the latest album by a synth-pop group that’s become known, in its members’ own words, as “the ‘queer joy mini-skirt rollerblade’ band.” MUNA—the trio of Katie Gavin, Naomi McPherson, and Josette Maskin—earned that reputation thanks to the runaway success of their 2021 hit “Silk Chiffon,” the opening track of their ebullient, sparkly self-titled third album, from 2022. But when Gavin was asked about making Dancing on the Wall, the band’s latest—and about making queer, libidinous music in an increasingly puritanical era more generally—she cited Gessen’s book. “Being in your body and being connected to your desire makes you less pessimistic,” she said. “I’m interested in a world where people can fuck and at the same time strive to treat each other well.”
To explore those themes, they embrace a decidedly darker palette. Dancing on the Wall’s production, handled by McPherson, dials back the radiant synth riffs and breezy textures of MUNA’s self-titled. Instead, these songs get basslines that throb with anxiety and shuffling percussion that trips over its feet as Gavin mourns the carelessness of a distracted lover (“Mary Jane”) or bemoans the nerve of a hottie who wants to date anyone but her (“Girl’s Girl”). More often than condemning the outside world, though, these songs point the blame inward, exposing the stupid things we do when desire hijacks our brain. The title track and “On Call” pair punchy, deceptively upbeat production with tales of self-delusion and romantic martyrdom; “Why Do I Get a Good Feeling” recounts a self-destructive crush over a swirling, garage-lite beat. If we want society to be less gullible, these songs seem to suggest, perhaps we start by questioning our own logic about relationships, our own habits of self-sabotage.
The album’s lighter moments are more directly rooted in pleasure, especially the pleasure of community. The bridge of “Eastside Girls,” a tribute to L.A.’s queer scene, rolls out a list of sapphic essentials (astrology, non-monogamy, gender-affirming healthcare) so on the nose, it starts to feel like an inside joke; ditto the word-of-mouth web of interconnected lesbians on “Girl’s Girl” that sounds like The L Word’s famous chart come to life. “Wannabeher” is like “Rebel Girl” if you swapped the punk guitars for fuzzed-out chords and the radical feminist solidarity for being gay and really, really horny.
Dancing on the Wall’s most overtly political song is “Big Stick,” a sexy little pop song about propaganda from the narrative perspective of Big Brother. “I can make you want anything that I want you to,” Gavin repeats, as the song’s stakes ratchet up: You want the cute outfit you order from TikTok Shop; you want a surveillance camera outside your house, tracking your neighbors; you want American bombs falling on Palestine. The song is something of an outlier—the band has alluded to political realities in its songs before, but never quite as explicitly as it does here. Still, however jarring the prospect of hearing this song live, bookended by sing-along anthems about love and crushes, it suits the album’s moodier tone.
If the success of “Silk Chiffon” made MUNA temporary ambassadors for queer joy, it did so in the midst of a rising wave of successful sapphic pop stars—and in a moment when, though right-wing actors were fomenting anti-LGBTQ sentiment, at least the president professed to believe there were “at least three” genders. A few years later, pop hasn’t gotten less gay, but queer people have to deal with a sharp increase in terrifying legislation—licenses suddenly becoming invalidated, access to healthcare getting revoked—against a backdrop of raging wildfires and ongoing genocide. Being out and proud has perhaps never been a less remarkable artistic identity, and joy is increasingly harder to come by. In response, MUNA aren’t cynical enough to keep cashing in on rollerblades and mini-skirts, nor gullible enough to think a pop song will change the world. Instead, their record is more interested in the truth of their own pleasures and failures, and in the ways both of those can, on the best of days, connect us more closely with each other.
