In 2005 Imogen Heap released “Hide and Seek” on Speak For Yourself. The track has a line I’ve never quite been able to shake, “crop circles in the carpet/sinking/feeling.” It is a reflection on an obvious, yet overlooked piece of life that is simple.
As if grabbing hold of this sentiment, perhaps not in directly lyrical association, but in effect, Ghoste’s “Slow Motion” opens her self-titled EP and immediately captures our attention. The track captures a sense of finding simplicity in the chaos, the sense of intimacy in a world surrounded by people. Shifting into the haunting introspective “Deep Water,” the pace change reveals a well-restrained vocal delivery balanced delicately against a bass-heavy contemplation. Ghoste’s sound floats effortlessly above the consciousness on electro beats in pop assemblies. The tone-heavy EP reflects in a pool of captivating depths crafted by placing a Lennox-esc air of emptiness in just the right places, feeling too evocative to be truly pop, but too present to fall into the sense of jazz or R&B. Ghoste does well to not be captured by an over-produced condensed sound and frees itself with subtle, yet bold chances. Even when presented with her take on “Fix You,” the EP finds strength in being honest to itself. The five tracks, wrapping with “Brick by Brick” carries with them a sense of modern, but an elegance that refuses to anchor to a time.
Like sitting, staring out a window focused on the droplets on the pane, blurring the towering monoliths of engineering vying for peak human capacity blurred beyond, Ghoste draws the simple out in a world where we’re all too often overcome by the complex. Moreover, it feels refreshingly familiar without overstaying it’s welcome, much like we experience when we overlook the simple things in life. The electronic foundations aren’t overbearing, the vocals soothing, Ghoste is precisely what it aimed to be and it is five tracks demonstrating just that.