Most people would know Caroline Polachek as the voice and one half of electro-pop outfit Chairlift. Since their disbanding in 2017, Polachek has not left the door to her musical output closed, releasing music under the name Ramona Lisa, then venturing further to a more instrumental based output of music under the name CEP, her initials.
‘Door’, the new single under her own name, is a blissful tune about this feeling of openness – to emotion, and to new beginnings attributed to using her own name. “Back in the city/I’m just another girl in a sweater/perpetual novice” she begins in her graceful tone, with airy electric piano chords forming a cloud-like atmosphere, paving the way for Caroline to venture toward the delicate sense of wonder in the slow jam electro beat and call and response of the chorus. Caroline Polachek’s vocal is smooth and harmonious in the leaps and bounds of the melody, demonstrating her particularly acrobatic range as the song reaches its close with a plucked string riff.
Its music video, directed by Caroline Polachek and Matt Dobson, is equal parts surreal and serene, straight out a Salvador Dali melting clock dreamscape, each scene a rainbow of vivid colours. Caroline sits atop a rooftop with a cartoonish night sky backdrop, then wanders through an open iron gate with a rusty orange sunset filter evoking a land far off in the imagination. The video’s depth of field and scope is as long as the infinite hallway of doors and mirrors her lithe voice echoes through, reflecting off every surface and shining in many directions. Listening to this track, one can’t help but wonder: what other doors will the enthralling Caroline Polachek open in this new venture of releasing music under her name, and in what sonic direction will it take her? At the end of each verse, Caroline questions, “Who is the you I sing to?” as she searches for a new answer at the opening of each doorway, eager to meet whatever – and whoever - lies behind it. It’s a direct question for us, the listener, to consider. Through ‘Door’, Caroline Polachek has introduced us to this musical identity that is solely her own self, unassuming and intimate in this musical setting. And she wants us to meet her halfway with the same openness and honesty of heart, on the other side of the door.
Watch the video for ‘Door’ below: