Mirah :: "Oxen Hope"

Mirah first made her appearance in my listening catalogue sometime ten years ago on a mixtape from a person with whom things were extremely complicated. The inclusion of "Recommendation", still one of my top five break-up songs for its mixture of vulnerability and blithe feminism, proved to be a crusher - a lyrics like "let's go sit under the apple tree" becoming dreadfully important despite the lack of apple trees in the immediate vicinity. Returning with a new record and the first look, "Oxen Hope", Mirah is still lodged firmly in the bedroom, small arrangements with bombastic flourishes, perhaps updated here with the addition of vocoder in the second half. If Liz Phair was the archetypical feminist of the mid-1990s, shouting her complicated grungy anthems from the rooftop, Mirah was the master of the intimate in the 2000s, a quieter kill. Still at it ten years later, she sings on "Oxen Hope", "Seems like the future is always going to have its way". Her return is statement of agency enough.