Hard To Swallow, Easy To Follow

Tei Shi’s latest EP, Bad Premonition, is full of the same magic that captures the eyes of those walking the grounds of the Taj Mahal. It’s pearly in its scale, grand in its outlook, and again and again annihilates what it’s going for. Even so, the work’s themes get at familiarity, exploiting it as its subject material but not celebrating it as something that trumps the triumphal nature of the journey it goes on to create. The result? About twenty minutes of the same peace mermaids are granted as they swim through the waters of the ocean. 

The first song, “FAMILIAR,” doesn’t have the most pleasant opening. To play with words opposite its title, it’s grim and uninviting but it stretches itself out so that its sounds somehow resemble the music over the opening shots of a Blade Runner–like movie. Moreover, when making music, catching a vibe that evokes the seeming serenity of flying through the air isn’t hard to accomplish with any type of combination of instruments. Spitting in the face of that belief, however, is what each track a part of the whole ends up doing. Playfulness becomes the album’s most robust muscle. 

Many of the songs, though, appeal to a sense of some sort of knowledge of pop culture on Tei Shi’s end, a lot of them establishing themselves as forces to be reckoned with. They’re enhanced by various instrumentation: silky synths, potent pumps, breaks that bridge barriers and guitar synths, especially those able to be taken into the ear on “¿QUIÉN TE MANDA?.” Things are thus funky on this track, albeit a tad demonic with the inclusion of some of its lyrical content. Nevertheless, fun isn’t absent, as its background sounds emulate those heard out of an alien’s blaster. 

If the talk of the strongest track is to come up, which happens after eating up all of their individual elements, whether they be impactful and beneficial or meaningless and aimless, the mention of “MONA LISA” must meet its birth, and cannot be excused from conversation. As entrancing as Peter Pan himself, this track contains quiet poetry that roars, and could take its spot booming in the speakers at any ballet recital. Including teases, such as the lyric “I’m the Mona Lisa you’ve been trying to repaint,” it plays with history and explores the world in interesting ways. 

A necessary component of the wings upon which this album flies on is the sprinkling of Spanish into certain tracks. While uncertainty’s in the air, surely, the rays of life Shi excites through childish musings are, in actuality, the rainbow-colored footprints all listeners need to follow so that their liberating walk with this art is to meet its highest levels of efficacy. 

This latest work of Shi’s is screaming to be taken seriously as a piece of art, calling for attention, presenting a precedent never heard before. Though it’s mostly chill and relaxed, here and there it causes for a few callbacks to the quick-feeling pop of the mid-2010s. It’s slow but impactful, smooth but steady, and, perhaps most of all, positions itself in the right place at the right time. What’s not insipid to say is that it’s the dream album of a kindergartner who’s merely sticking around to experience the fun adventure of life. But what’s more, at the end of the day, Bad Premonitions should not be inspiring any kind of bad premonitions.