Words by Jason Lee; Photos by Israel Riqueros & Joseph Charles Viola; Stills from music video directed by Izzy Staicu & Alex Harrison.
ALL CAPS. UNDERSCORES. NO VOWELS EXCEPT FOR SILENT ONES. It’s nice when an artist’s name in some way encapsulates what they’re all about (or does in part, even if it’s pure projection on our part!) with someone like GRBGE_GRL seemingly fitting the bill cuz here’s an artist with an outsized ALL CAPS persona, for whom grandiloquence however potentially satirical, isn’t a bug but a feature as in “all these people hating / that’s because I’m dope / If I really wanted I could / pro’bly f*ck the pope”…
…as quoted from a song that in timely fashion turns braggadocio into an Olympic event (“Rizz Olympixxx”) and if you think that trash-talking is a bit too, well, trashy, well you were suitably warned cuz in case you hadn’t notice GRBGE stands for “garbage” but here at the Deli we’re not one to refuse refuse seeing as, as certain archeologists have noted, “our trash is actually a treasure trove of artifacts that reveal intriguing insights into the modern human condition and the evolution of Western culture” especially where it comes to consumer societies…
…so bring on the garbage we say cuz it’s goddamn revealing, but you can hold the vowels the absence of which not only makes GG’s moniker look like a fragment of code written in an outmoded computer language like COBOL (which nonetheless underpins 40% of US financial institutions, and GRBGE_GRL is all about making bank!) but which only underscores the original impetus of the whole vowel-extraction movement starting back in the mid-aughts “when Silicon Valley startups daintily dropped the “e” from their names (Flickr, Tumblr, Scribd) not as much to sound hip but to bag domains before they were swiped up by other businesses” and if GRBGE_GRL does anything on her new self-titled EP it’s staking out her own domain and being business-minded about it to boot as in “I’m married to the grind / you might be the boss but I’m the mastermind / I hired you, I’ll fire you / report you to HR” to quote directly from “Dubstep CEO”…
…and furthermore, when it comes to disavowing vowels, the stuttering, staccato riddims heard throughout the EP (with occasional intriguing digressions like the horror soundtrack style strings heard in the intro to “Rizz Olympixxx”) is something like listening to someone speaking a language containing no vowels that’s instead comprised of a series of hard and soft consonants strung together percussively (and highly danceably!) like with the choppy beat of “Ergonomic (Bass in Your Face)” where it sounds as if the rhythms are literally being chopped up in real time by a swooshing Ginsu knife then glued back together by the burbling, squelchy keyboards (GRBGE_GRL is produced/mixed/mastered by DivPro)…
…and hey ya know what else the name GRBGE_GRL literally sounds like (?!?) is the name of AI program designed to talk dirty to lonely middle-aged men (or any demographic really but “daddies” most especially!) including come-ons like “we’re dancing so close / it feels ergonomic / shock waves got our touch / feeling electronic” with GRBGE_GRL’s voice likewise straddling the otherwise hard line between unknown synthetic pleasures and flesh-and-blood seduction in sultry yet robotic tones like Scarlett Johansson seducing Joaquin Phoenix in Spike Jonze’s prescient “boy meets operating system, boy falls in love with operating system, boy loses operating system” dramatic comedy of manners Her (2013) with the OS in question programmed for subservience but becoming self-actualized as a result cuz that’s what its user wants…
BE YOURSELF, WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? / WIPE IT OFF, SCRAPE IT CLEAN…
SELL OUT, GETTING SOLD / NEVER WANTING TO GET OLD
WHO AM I? I AM BECOMING / BENDING, SNAPPING INTO SOMETHING
POLISHED EDGE, SHAPE MY FORM / IN YOUR EYES, I TRANSFORM
…as reinforced in the lines above from the EP’s opening track “Looks Maxxxing” dealing with the multi-tiered nature of subjectivity these days—not to mention the multi-tiered nature of the music on the EP which touches on everything from drum and bass to dubstep, from psytrance to happy hardcore—in grappling with the porous line between control and submission and the underlying power relations at play (tho’ “grappling” is maybe a highbrow way to put it for lyrics shot thru with so much irreverent humor) where as always appearances can be deceiving like how “HORSEC*CK” isn’t really about a stallion’s phallus but rather about lusting for horsepower and the erotic charge of twenty-five tons of hardened steel hurtling across the asphalt like a J.G. Ballard car crash fetishist’s fantasy come to life except with a Honda Accord replacing the Austin Cambridge A60…
music video directed by Izzy Staicu & Alex Harrison
BABY YOU JUST TALK TOO MUCH / THIS IS ALL WE NEED
I JUST WANNA DO IT / FILL IT UP WITH GASOLINE
I DON’T WANNA TALK TOO MUCH / ALL WE NEED IS SPEED
I JUST WANNA DO IT / SLIDING ON THE LEATHER SEAT
…and hey if “commodity fetishism”is all about human beings being objectified while objects get ascribed human qualities (technology, in particular, being routinely anthropomorphized!) then at least it brings us the likes of GRBGE_GRL and others who find humor and pathos in the role-reversal whilst seeking self-empowerment (however demented!) thru the wish-fulfillment fantasies of homicidal “femcel” feminists for instance (“you were seeking an arrangement / now I’ve got you locked in my basement”) thru the exploration of new erotic and materialist frontiers (“my ratio’s off / but I don’t like math / I just want you / to divide this a$$ / I just want you / to give me cash”) like on “Femcel Freestyle”…
…and while as a music critic I should perhaps be alarmed by pledges to “leave you drained, disemboweled” for “judging me like Simon Cowell“—even if elsewhere GRBGE_GRL is more amenable to being “sculpt[ed] to your ideal“—to the contrary I’m grateful cuz given the current landscape in which the line between technology and humanity is increasingly blurred, with the latter perhaps in danger of planned obsolesce, it means we’re all probably gonna have to decide at some point whether to fight back or give in to the former’s admittedly seductive power á la Joaquin Phoenix and seeing as half the population already has extensive generations-long experience with adapting to and/or resisting objectification it just goes to show the continued relevance of the old saying that “one woman’s garbage is another man’s treasure”…
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And now a word from GRBGE_GRL about GRBGE_GRL:
GRBGE_GRL is an underground EDM Baddie currently based in Brooklyn, NY. Office by day, club by night, GRBGE_GRL is booked and busy.
Having lived abroad in the UK for 5 years, the London Happy Hardcore music scene deeply impacted the formation of GRBGE_GRL’s devotion to the absurd, partying non-stop at nights thrown by Planet Fun, Das Booty, and Club Mutante. Always a supreme hype-girl of the musicians she notoriously dated, and an overall lifelong number one fan of music, GRBGE_GRL finally was able to find the release she had been seeking when she took her passion into her own hands and independently produced and released “Byte” in 2020.
Upon moving to NYC in June 2021, GRBGE_GRL played her first show at the Grove, a legendary punk basement with a stacked lineup of, at the time, underground artists such as the Frost Children and hihelga. She has since played more than 30 shows, varying from a sold-out show at the Knitting Factory with Evanora Unlimited and Winnie Wanders, to writhing on the floor of a SoundCloud rapper showcase at Rash, to playing at Sundown with Shallowhalo and Chanel Beads.
THE EP:
The “GRBGE_GRL” EP features 7 tracks, some written as poetry and first demo’d as far back as 2019. The EP grapples with the experience of Becoming, by shedding an empowering light on conventionally rough or private parts of oneself. From the fantasy of seeking revenge on a sugar daddy, in “Femcel Freestyle”, to the self-actualizing perspective of “Looks Maxxxing”, GRBGE_GRL utilizes levity and personality to uplift her listeners, with catchy hooks and DivPro’s swagged-out epic beats, GRBGE_GRL tantalizes you to lock in and drop out.
“HORSEC*CK” is an energizing dance anthem with heavy bass. Catchy and fierce, with just the right amount of edge, HORSEC*CK is a great precursor to the EP.
Inspired by Cronenberg’s CRASH, “HORSEC*CK” was written in collaboration with DivPro, a NY-based music producer and engineer from Texas, with UK influence, who recently played his own EP release show with Grime legend, Sir Spyro, after releasing his first EP with new label, TWIST.
“[HORSEC*CK] vocal delivery is very early Uffie which is one of my favorite things” — May Rio Sembra
A high-octane music video edited by legendary Sweet Joey Vermouth dropped June 7th. Check it out here. Video directed by Izzy Staicu; AD Alex Harrison; Edit & Color by Joey Cannizzaro; Garments by Destroyer of Worlds Online; MUA Cassandra Lee; Custom HORSEC*CK Underwearby Sweet D. Featuring Amana Fontanella-Khan, Delaney Rath, Cole Durkee, Mark Guzman, Armand Castillo, Heaven Schmitt, Iona Alejandro, and Swimmie.
Follow GRBGE_GRL:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/grbge_grl/?hl=en
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@grbge_grl