EP Review: Lene – Like a Stranger

Like a Stranger, the new EP from Lene, takes you many places musically and thematically, but you always end up back at that magnificent voice.

Mighty things come in surprising packages, and that is certainly the case on Like a Stranger, because it’s amazing to see such a classic voice come from such a young artist. Heaven (even if it’s fake) puts Lene in the same category as artists like Joy Crookes, Olivia Dean, and Lianne La Havas, even as she brings an indie sensibility to the song’s R&B roots.

I Wanna Be Your Lover tweaks the indie-R&B paradigm, trip-hop and dream pop giving the song unexpected textures and tones, smooth and silky, with a hint of regret under all that romance. That gem is followed by Under All This Rain; it just sends you to the heavens, with light echoes of Anita Baker’s Sweet Love resident in its core, fusing with an indie-R&B-downtempo confluence that is as atmospheric as it vibrant.

Each track throws you a sonic curveball, with The Journey harking back to the era of Quiet Storm, smooth and romantic, the jazz influences given an update to give the arrangement and melody a ‘sad pop’ melody – and an epic guitar solo that somehow works within the chilled context and heart-rending lyrics. When Lene sings of ‘the journey not being worth the love we had,’ you can just hear your heart break.

Lene isn’t averse to mixing up her genres, even if at first, they seem incongruous – Nightmare has elements of baroque from the intro, as well as the downtempo moments of Air in its eclectic arrangement, but as elsewhere, it’s her voice that commands the song to obey the rules of R&B, smoky and full of unspoken emotions.

The title track comes last on the album, brings you back to the R&B/Quiet Storm sound, and, once again, wouldn’t require much to shift the song somewhere in a trip-hop vein until that tonal change at the two-minute mark.

The EP is inventive, not limiting itself creatively or sonically, with surprise after surprise not just from song to song, but within each song itself. It allows the varied aspects of the EP: indie and alternative R&B, soul, trip-hop and sometimes full-out rock – to play a role but always within the context of a remarkable, timeless voice.

Like a Stranger was released on the 27th of March and is streaming on all major streaming platforms, including Spotify and SoundCloud. Catch up with Austin, Texas based Lene on Facebook and Instagram to learn more about the album and the artist behind the music.