Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Billie Eilish, Universal Music 2019.
Billie Eilish’s debut album is amazing for its audaciousness and uncompromisingly dark vision.
It usually takes musicians some time to hone their craft and develop the confidence to express a clear vision, and also to consciously swim against the current.
Billie has not only achieved this with her debut album but she’s also shot straight to the top of the Billboard Top 200.
Most artists have to release a portfolio of albums to even get close to bagging a number one record but not so for this supremely talented musician.
While When We Fall Asleep Where Do We Go is Billie Eilish’s debut album it’s not the first time that she’s made the charts.
Her 2014 EP Don’t Smile At Me reached a high point of 14 on the Billboard charts and achieved Gold Record status.
In addition, she has currently had eight singles chart in the Billboard Top 100 including four from this album.
She first charted in 2016 with a song, Ocean Eyes, she wrote when she was 14 years old.
It’s hard to categorise this album.
Some have called it dark indie or gothic pop. The lyric material is dark in its vision and the music is often atmospheric and moody.
Whatever musical genre you wish to call it the record is quite hypnotic.
She sometimes sings with a childlike innocence and sometimes with a menacing maturity but the songs are always totally engrossing.
While her star is rising all over the world it seems that we Australians have really taken to her because she currently holds six of the top 10 spots on the ARIA Singles Charts.
And that’s not the end of the impact of this album because another six tracks have also charted lower down the list.
That means that 12 of 14 songs from When We Dream Where Do We Go? have made the ARIA Top 50 Singles Chart.
This sort of success has been achieved by very few artists.
She’s up there with The Beatles and ABBA.
