Thursday 8/13: glaive—"pissed"
Today, we share our thoughts on a recent song by the ~hyperpop~ artist glaive.
Welcome to Endless Scroll, the brainchild of Eli Enis (he/him) and Eric Bennett (they/them). Since Feb. 2019, we’ve been a weekly podcast about music, the internet, and where those two things intersect. Now we’re, also a M-F newsletter about songs. Our format is simple: a link to a song and a short take from each of us about what we think of it. Each day of the week has a corresponding genre: Monday is indie, Tuesday is punk, Wednesday is hip-hop, Thursday is pop, and Friday is misc.
Today, we share our thoughts on a recent song by the ~hyperpop~ artist glaive.
glaive—“pissed”
Eli Enis:
I can’t seem to find where glaive is from, but that doesn’t really matter. The 15-year-old is one of many teenagers currently making sub-two-minute pop songs that blur bubblegum bass, cloud rap, emo-rap, and pop-punk. What you call this type of music doesn’t really matter either, but I’m sure glaive would either roll their eyes or nod agreeably if you tagged it hyperpop. What’s clear is that glaive has only been uploading tracks to Soundcloud since the pandemic began, and they’ve already written at least one perfect pop song. “pissed” is a pesky earworm that marries post-P.C. Music pop with mid-panic attack emo a la The Used or Hawthorne Heights. The ingredients are simple: pinchy vocals, a squeaky synth melody, and a bouncy hip-hop groove. But it’s the physical pain that glaive channels with their voice that pierces through all the computerized glitz and lands a puncturing, intensely human sentiment. “I'm so pissed, I'm angry as fuck/ I wanna kill myself, but you're calling my bluff,” they sing with a warble that evokes choking back tears. glaive is just one in a seemingly endless scene of internet-operative pop artists who treat auto-tune not as artistic flair, but as essential to the composition as the vocals themselves. “pissed” stands out in a crowded field because it’d be a great pop song with or without its de jour musical makeup.
Eric Bennett:
It’s not everyday you hear a song that makes a catchy hook out of the phrase “I wanna kill myself.” These, however, are the central lyrics to glaive’s “pissed,” a sparkling, aggressive bop. It’s eyebrow-raising just how inoffensive and void of consequence it feels when they’re spoken. In another era, this is the sort of thing parents would panic their children were listening to; that the devil was corrupting them. The track is just under two minutes, ripe for repeat listens, and packs in enough layered dark, glitchy pop to leave an impression on its production alone. Also, music aside, glaive is such a good name for your project. Bands, stop naming yourselves after sports, and start naming yourselves after obscure weaponry. Oh, your band’s named after field hockey? Cool, this one’s named after a staff with a blade attached to it.