In 2023, a Wisp song became the first overnight success in the almost four-decade history of shoegaze. Recorded using iPhone earbuds over a YouTube producer’s instrumental, ‘Your Face’ was immediately beguiling, like a lost Deftones song tinged with sweet alt-pop yearning. Natalie Lu, then just 18, had a viral TikTok hit on her hands. She’s since signed with Interscope, opened for Slowdive, played Coachella, and on last year’s debut EP ‘Pandora’, proved that ‘Your Face’ was no fluke.
‘If Not Winter’, her first full-length, sheds Wisp’s mystique and places her fully in the spotlight – with artwork and music videos that style her as a medieval fantasy heroine. The lead single ‘Sword’ shows she’s upped her ambitions. It has more precise arrangements, a much clearer mix and a chorus that sets up the album’s emotional stakes: “When is it my turn to not live in fear? / What are you afraid of?”
On ‘Mesmerized’, and the singles ‘Breathe onto Me’ and ‘Save Me Now’, she’s mastered the approach introduced on ‘Pandora’. The wall of metallic power chords and drums hits you first, but it’s her vocals that draw you in. Small yet resilient, it’s as if Lu’s confessing her most vulnerable thoughts while shying away from them at the same time – which is fitting for a record named after a collection of Sappho’s poetry.
The album’s most promising moments come when she colours outside the lines. On ‘Guide Light’, woozy, My Bloody Valentine-inspired guitars slow to a crawl halfway through, leading into the ambient birdsong interlude ‘Latvia’. The title track, a lush emo ballad that fades into a lonely piano, follows with her strongest songwriting to date: “My hands are turning blue / But my heart only knows to ruin / I’m not someone that chose to wound.”
For the most part, ‘If Not Winter’ is perfect pop shoegaze, constructed around Lu’s crisp vocal melodies first, with lyrics a close second and atmosphere third. While almost every song could work as a single, they can blend together on the album as a whole. Though the emotional details can get swept up in the wall of sound, ‘If Not Winter’ is still a triumphant debut – and more than anything, the sound of a young artist who’s still growing into herself.
