FKA twigs - Caprisongs

“I made you a mixtape,” opens FKA twigs early on ‘Caprisongs’, as if to hammer home the notion this 17-track release is not, in fact, an album. And not being the follow-up proper to 2019’s much-lauded ‘Magdalene’ is ideal: we find a twigs experimenting not with, say, textures or song structure, but with dipping her toes into the mainstream; trying things on for shits and giggles. In that vein, a relaxed self-awareness runs through the interludes: the lack of Dua Lipa collaboration ‘Why Don’t You Love Me?’ is referenced on ‘pamplemousse’; on ‘which way’ she attests “I’m not the rockstar’s girlfriend, I am the rockstar girlfriend… Like, I’m not the accessory.” Sitting somewhere between say Beyoncé’s auteur-like use of collaborators on ‘Lemonade’ and how Grimes’ ‘Art Angels’ saw the contrary Canadian flex shimmering, glossy pop nous, ‘Caprisongs’ has twigs throwing out hooks left, right and centre; ‘oh my love’ is an ultimate earworm and glorious pop moment, while ‘meta angel’ could easily slip into PC Music-branded shoes. Throughout, twigs skips between styles. There’s the Pa Salieu-featuring ‘honda’, the Shygirl-starring, dancehall- referencing ‘papi bones’, and ‘darjeeling’ - a team-up with Jorja Smith and Unknown T which interpolates Olive’s 1996 dance hit ‘You’re Not Alone’. Yet still, she maintains her musical curiosity, such as on the choral-infused ‘minds of men’, or vocal effect breakdown of ‘lightbeamers’. That there’s a contribution from the world’s most-streamed artist is almost lost among the noise, but that The Weeknd’s turn on ‘tears in the club’ blends in on this release probably just proves the only reason twigs hasn’t yet topped the charts is because she hasn’t yet wanted to.