Oh My My My

I was introduced to the music of Laur Elle about a month ago and I have been listening to her music daily ever since. I especially connected with the Deluxe Edition of her sophomore album Delayed Reaction. I was blown away by the fact this it was only the second album she had released as it contains such a brilliant, unique and grounded sound as if she has spent many years perfecting it.

Find her music and all things Laur Elle here. I would honestly be thrilled if you stopped reading now and went to listen the album I mentioned above as it is just so magnificent.

Delayed Reaction (Deluxe Edition)

Delayed Reaction

“Cut ties blew up my life

I ran away and I'm still brushing the ashes from my suitcase

So all my clothes are the same shade of grey and I'm sick of it

Still in the thick of it

So I go out with a vengeance

You never know I'm doing my best impression

Of somebody who's fine it's almost impressive

How it's almost working, yeah it's almost working”

There could be many reasons for “setting fire to your life” and none of them I can think of are particularly pleasant. Love, life, relationships are all complicated and most often when you take drastic action you do so only because it was your determination that there are no other options. That is the feeling that I get from this. Your life was upended and for a while you were going through the motions just trying to survive and finally the weight and repercussions of everything finally hit you and you must deal with the fallout. I enjoy just how vivid a picture is painted just in this first verse of the track.

“You were the best thing that I ever had to let go

So I kept running faster, to keep it from killing me slow

Oh I think I kind of underreacted

I got in the habit of acting like it never happеned

Now I'm having a delayed rеaction”

It’s like you were running from a burning fuse that eventually did catch up to you, everything exploded and you can no longer ignore what happened. It has come time to face the music as they say. There is no way to know the length of time that lapsed here but it was long enough that a habit was made out of ignoring past events so I would venture to guess it was a good length of time. Anyone who has been through a particularly arduous break up knows what the feeling is like when the reality of it all crashes into you like a tidal wave.

“Put you carefully in boxes

All of my favorite parts in the back of the closet

I didn't want them out but I couldn't toss it

And now I'm just haunted

This whole house is haunted”

This is such a brilliant metaphor for the aftermath of a long relationship. There are all these memories you have and many things you see and experience will remind of this person that you just want to forget about. Yet simultaneously there are also situations where you find yourself also not wanting to forget. You try to pack it all away but it is completely unavoidable. 

“If I don't watch the end of the movie

Then I'm not the villain who ended it cruelly

And I want you running everything through me

Hope you know that you were everything to me

If I don't watch the end of the movie

Then I won't see all the future in losing

And I love how you run everything through me

Hope you know that you were everything to me”

You elected to have an abrupt ending in order to avoid how messy things would have played out or at least you thought things would’ve played out. You’re trying to convince yourself that this way better whether you actually believe that it is true or you’re just trying to make yourself feel better about it. I feel it is quite possible that it could both be that it was better of many bad options and you feel bad about doing it.  

The Man

“You say you miss me but that means something so different to you

You say you want me but you only want another excuse

To say you got me 'cause you get high on the thought that you do

You love to think you're the man, boy it's not working for you

Except on any day that ends with "y"

I'm telling everyone that it's nothing

But I'm like oh, my god I might die

From wonderin'

Why I never listen?

Why I over-romanticize?

Why I'm holding on to a version of you I made up, I designed

You say you miss me but that means something so different to you

You say you want me but you only want another excuse

To say you got me 'cause you get high on the thought that you do

You love to think you're the man, boy it's not working for you

Honestly I don't care, you made every mistake

Is it your cold indifference that makes me feel this way?

Or your dirty blond hair, how you're pulling me close

Man I really dropped the bar down low, low, low, low

Lay me down with reasons

That I've over-romanticized

'Cause I'm holding on to a version of you I made up, I designed

You say you miss me but that means something so different to you

You say you want me but you only want another excuse

To say you got me 'cause you get high on the thought that you do

You love to think you're the man, boy it's not working for you”

This is one of the best songs I’ve discovered in quite a while. It is so brilliantly written and flows so well. It so clearly tells a story and gets a point across in such a way that there is really no mistaking it. I simply cannot get over the way that there’s both this acknowledgement that they made mistakes and also this other person in the relationship was quite toxic. In fact it seems to me that they probably always were. It just took probably too long to see it. You were holding on to whatever you could and filling in the gaps in your mind to make things seem okay. There can be many reasons why you would keep a relationship alive despite knowing in your soul that it is not what it should be; that it is not good for you. This track is the thoughts that come after you snap out of it, once you’ve had the realization things just aren’t good now and perhaps they never were. It illustrates this kind of situation in such a relatable way and in addition to that it sounds so incredible.

As I have been thinking, what about this track impresses me so much is because from the first to the hundredth listen it felt so fresh and so new. When you think about it there hasn't really been anything new when it comes to the feelings expressed for centuries or perhaps even longer and when a song can make you forget that; it’s a truly magnificent thing. It doesn’t matter how many times you have heard a song with similar themes before, in that moment when you are listening there is only that song and everything else just fades away.  That is really the best way I can describe what listening to this track is like for me and why I haven’t been able to stop listening to it. 

Lost Cause

“Been a lost cause, I'm lost for words

Lost a bet, and that still hurts

But this time I think that I lost myself”

I think this is a brilliant way to hook people at the beginning; as we have no context for why they feel like a lost cause or what this horrible bet was that they lost which hurt so badly. By the end of the song we don’t get any definitive information regarding these things but I don’t think you need to make much of a leap to guess that the feelings discussed in the beginning have to do with love and past relationship(s). 

“Was it when you dropped your guard

For five whole seconds my whole heart

Romanticized becoming someone else”

“My whole heart romanticized” I love the imagery here to set this apart from previous times when something like this has happened before. It was different this time; you feel yourself falling with everything that you have.

“I think I've, lost track of morning texts

The way they make me more obsessed

I'm hanging on to every single word (every single word)

You're the, long nights between the days

The reason I can't stay awake

And coffee only seems to make it worse”

What I get from this is the idea that you are so into this individual or at least the idea that you have of them that you are dreaming about them. They are the long nights between the days as the thoughts of them fill your even your dreams yet they also fill the thoughts during your waking moments so “coffee only seems to make it worse.” It doesn’t matter when or where they’ve almost become your whole world. Which leads quite nicely into the next part. 

“Get it together kid

I think you've lost your mind

Do you wanna be this messed up all the time?”

There is this realization that whatever this is that’s happening cannot continue to happen. You have finally got to the point where you have that moment and look yourself in the mirror and think “come on, what are you doing?” It's when you decide you must either commit to doing something or get out.

“I get so excited when I see you my head stops

Thinking straight I wanna tell you everything

I've been dreaming bout

Coming down

I'm way out

Over my head”

It is one thing to dream or to think about something but it is another thing entirely to actually take the plunge; to convince yourself that it is worth the risk to put your heart on the line and act. It is not enjoyable to feel vulnerable and this could certainly make you feel like a lost cause though depending on what you do with it that could be either a good or a bad thing and I enjoy that aspect of this track; it really makes me think about how the line between love and heartbreak is an incredibly thin one.

Oh My My My

“Your channel changes like a radio station

Hand on the dial while I'm trying to navigate it

You tripping over everything in your way and

I'll run ahead so I can clear the pavement

I can't lie

I'm tired of picking up your pieces

One by one, 'til it all falls down

Oh my my my

Oh my my my

I, I, I take the lows and hold out for highs

Let your emotions take me for a ride (I)

Oh my my my

Oh my my my

I, I, can't walk away, it kills me when you cry

Let your emotions take me for a ride (ride)

Ride, oh, I, oh I

Ride, oh, I, oh I

I keep on telling everyone that I've got this

It's worth the wait, it's all part of the process

Nothing's been going quite the way that you've wanted

And I'm afraid I won't know how to stop it”

This track is a unique take on relationships just not shaping up to be everything you thought they would. It’s seemingly not due to any major slight by one party or the other but perhaps due to being in different places on the journey of life. When something like this happens you can be with someone; be right next to them and yet feel as if there’s this great divide between the two of you that cannot be crossed. It can be hard to figure out how to leave as if your relationship has become this bullet train and you don’t know how to stop it without causing a wreck. Lines in the song such as “I'm tired of picking up your pieces” “I, I, I take the lows and hold out for highs” “I, I, can't walk away, it kills me when you cry, let your emotions take me for a ride” all contribute to me thinking this way. The second verse especially; trying to convince yourself it will get better if you just hold out. Yet also wondering how you would end things if you did want to. You find yourself caught in this emotionally trying loop that is seemingly inescapable; this track present that concept in such a relatable way.

There is so much packed into this track and that is the case with this entire album. Each time I listen I find myself thinking about different ways to think about each track and gleaning new insights from the wise words set to some extremely catchy, and addictive beats.