Song of the Day: Angel Olsen - Shut Up Kiss Me

Every Monday through Friday, we deliver a different song as part of our Song of the Day podcast subscription. This podcast features exclusive KEXP in-studio performances, unreleased songs, and recordings from independent artists that our DJ’s think you should hear. Today’s song, featured on the Midday Show with Cheryl Waters, is "Shut Up Kiss Me" by Angel Olsen from her forthcoming record, My Woman, to be released September 2nd on Jagjaguwar.

Angel Olsen - Shut Up Kiss Me (MP3)

Don't pigeonhole Angel Olsen. In her self-directed clip for "Shut Up Kiss Me," the second single off her forthcoming record, My Woman, Angel Olsen stars as many characters, perhaps facets of a single person, while donning a glitter wig and lime green jacket, reminiscent of a less perverse version of David Lynch's Blue Velvet. Needless to say, her tongue is firmly planted in cheek.

Since releasing her debut album in 2012, the acoustic, melancholy Half Way Home, Olsen has never ceased to transform as a songwriter. Starting her career in the band of indie stalwart Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Olsen first broke out of the gothic folk mold with the single from her 2014 LP, Burn You Fire for No Witness, "Forgiven/Forgotten" (a track which NPR Music heads Robin Hilton and Bob Boilen were shocked featured electric guitar). Since then, she has continued to evade the mold of the "country-folk sad-sack lost in a forest," (qtd. from a Pitchfork article on Olsen) most recently with the video for "Shut Up Kiss Me," an overt rejection of the stereotypes attached to her by critics. Angel Olsen got bored being cast as a flora-laden singer-songwriter, so she became a roller-skating glam rock icon trapped in a 1950s horror film, with the songwriting skills to match.

Olsen has always been able to communicate many emotions through a single lyric, a talent evident in the contradictions of the title line - "Shut up kiss me// hold me tight//stop your crying// it's alright." The first repetition of this line, accompanied by an influx of drum, bass, and guitar, feels like a boiling over - a simultaneous desperation, loss, and strength coming through in Olsen's vocals. Near the end of the track, her voice breaks out in a full-throated melodic shriek, the lyrics melting away into brute emotion. In a year which already has Dude York's love-questioning anthem "Love Is," "Shut Up Kiss Me" joins it as an oddly joyous song ostensibly about love, which manages to destroy the institution through sheer vocal power.

Olsen will be touring the eastern and central US throughout the fall, and has said on Facebook a West Coast tour is in the works. Visit her website and Facebook for more information. In the meantime, watch the much discussed video for "Shut Up Kiss Me" below.