Pixie Geldof has spent the past decade in the limelight. The third daughter of Live Aid lynchpin Bob Geldof and television presenter Paula Yates, she’s a tabloid regular and occasional model who’s dabbled in music before, fronting the moody, Hole-worshiping group Violet a few years back. But now, at the age of 26, she’s decided to branch out alone with her solo debut – and this time around she’s even moodier.
Living out much of her life in the public eye probably goes some way to explaining the confidence that seeps through the 10 songs which make up ‘I’m Yours’, an album that’s as deeply atmospheric as Lana Del Rey going for a midnight walk through a rundown cemetery to buy a packet of 20 Marlboro Reds from the haunted offie on the other side. Del Rey is evidently a huge influence on the sound of this record too – the breathy vocals, the emotional outpourings and general feeling of malaise are lessons learned from a noir-pop masterclass. Even when Pixie’s singing about the good times, like on the lusty ‘Woman Go Wild’ and the “lipstick kisses”-smothered ‘Close To You’, there’s a lingering melancholy that suggests late night Whatsapp chats with Pixie are always pretty intense.
Yet even though the title track, ‘I’m Yours’ is feathery-soft and the cutesy ‘Wild Things Grow’ almost Disney-ish with its string-laden symphonics, this isn’t an album that lacks balls. The storming ‘Rain Comes Down’ sounds as weighty as prime 90s Garbage, adding a slick industrial stomp to the classic country music riffing that underpins the whole album, regularly harking back to Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood’s 1968 psychedelic-folk masterpiece ‘Nancy & Lee’.
It’s difficult not to mention Pixie Geldof’s debut album in the same breath as Thomas Cohen’s ‘Bloom Forever’, with both albums released two years down the line from the 2014 death of Peaches Geldof – Pixie’s sister and Cohen’s wife. But much like Cohen’s album, this isn’t an album that dwells on that tragedy. ‘Twin Thing’ is the only song that directly references her passing, but is perhaps one of the most beautiful, life-affirming tracks here. Here’s to Pixie, the pop star – it suits her.
