A few days ago, Swearin’s Allison Crutchfield, with the help of Radiator Hospital singer (Crutchfield’s “friend-muse”) Sam Cook-Parrott, unexpectedly released a new 7-track solo EP, Lean In To It, which she recorded at her parent’s house in Birmingham as well as her bedroom in Philly. Sam co-wrote the track “Lupe”, in addition to contributing bass and vocals, and presumably, serving as the person Crutchfield can bounce her songs’ ideas off of. The EP opens with “SUPERMOON”, setting the dreamy downtempo mood that takes each stunningly grainy track into the next, culminating in the final song, “Berlin”, that stands for the EP as a whole in all its heartbreaking rawness and determined uplift.
On “Rose Knows”, Allison and Sam exchange curt call-and-response lovesick snippets, alternating: “I just want love/This is exhausting/I want what everyone wants/I want nothing/I want you/I have nothing left to give”. The track’s playful angst is just shy of Woody Allen-esque, and the pair exhibit this same dynamic several times throughout the EP. Elsewhere, Crutchfield is far more introspective and contained, like on the epic penultimate track “You”, a sort of generational love ballad with one of the most beautiful melodies on the keys I have heard from a lo-fi bedroom outfit in a while. At just over four minutes, it’s the longest song on the EP, splicing in a Joni Mitchell lyric to the second line of the lyric, “My generation is not stoic or serene/ I’m gonna make a lot of money and quit this crazy scene” (1970’s “River”). The EP deserves all the love it will inevitably get, and a physical release is more than called-for.
As of now, you can get it for $5 on Bandcamp, or stream it in full, below.
