Presented against a brooding musical backdrop that includes a menacing groove from the guitar, bass, and drum components on a mostly equal playing field, Emily Daccarett’s vocal and the verses it shares produce the foundation for a potentially career-making single in “Love is a Dangerous Thing,” and with the aforementioned instrumentation they make this a performance that fans of sultry indie pop with a strong vocal focus can’t afford to miss out on. Daccarett is exceptionally firm in her delivery, but while she sticks to a conservative attack as a means of magnifying the value of the emotive music around her, I wouldn’t say that she’s giving us a halfhearted vocal on the other side of the band in “Love is a Dangerous Thing.”
INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/emilydaccarett/?hl=en
This single is about presenting the audience with unforced but still urgent statements of self that can establish her as a melodic crooner, and I think it hits the mark for what it’s been tasked with. This isn’t a particularly complicated piece of music, but by giving critics something that exhibits her abilities over the brawn of a pop hook, she does a lot more to confirm her eminence as a young singer/songwriter we need to be paying attention to.
The darker melodic elements in the music provide a very limited accent to the crashing guitar parts and moderate drums behind the melodic ribbonry, but while some might disagree based on radio readiness, I think it was better to go this way over spotlighting any inorganic instrumentation in the mix. In structuring a new song like this, we’re able to better appreciate the bit of hesitation in Daccarett’s vocal during the chorus, as well as other minute details we might not have been able to focus on – or even notice in the first place – had “Love is a Dangerous Thing” been produced in a fashion similar to some of her older material. It will be really interesting to see what kind of a presence she has during live performances of this track, but if it’s anything like what she can do in the studio, I don’t think it will leave anyone underwhelmed.
If the substance behind “Love is a Dangerous Thing” is on par with what Emily Daccarett is going to be releasing in the future, you can count on her momentum growing at an enormous rate on the back of a natural skillset that invites comparisons to classic players while still creating an independent identity truly hers and hers alone.
APPLE MUSIC: https://music.apple.com/ph/artist/emily-daccarett/820546218
There’s a very surreal element to her music that she hasn’t tapped into very much in the last few singles she’s released since 2020, and if she’s able to exploit it as she continues to develop her songwriting style she’s going to produce some incredible work. This is a career still in its infancy, and while the possibilities are practically endless at this moment, there’s no debate as to whether or not this is a singer and songwriter who has an amazing handle on the style she’s showing off here.
Garth Thomas