Download: Warpaint – “Billie Holiday”

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(from the “Exquisite Corpse” EP out now on Manimal Vinyl) 

Shop: Warpaint

An EP is supposed to be an appetizer for a band, leaving fans hungry for a full-length, and Warpaint’s six song “Exquisite Corpse” will certainly tantalize your palate.  Haunting vocals are driven by sweet three part harmonies, perfectly displayed on the third track, “Billie Holiday.”  The ode to the late songstress is not just a cover of “My Guy”—Warpaint take their own approach, repeating the letters of Holiday’s name in such a catchy way (like a sixties girl group, but jazzy) that you’ll soon have her name lodged in your own head for hours.  Some of these songs have a dreamy, slow feel, but “Beetles” picks up the pace, vocalist Theresa Wayman nearly rapping the verses—not in a Debbie Harry imitation, but by sweetly cooing words that might otherwise sound tacky: “let’s get naked/and rip down the walls/it makes me crazy.” The EP’s opener, “Stars,” is also a standout track, as it should be, being an opener and all.  We hear a few light plucks from a guitar, and then the voices of Theresa Wayman, Emily Kokal, and Jenny Lee Lindberg chime in with harmonies just as the track picks up.  It’s an intro that will draw you in for the duration of the EP.  Thank you, Manimal, for once again giving us a band that will be hard to remove from our record players.

–Ilyse Kaplan