By John Saeger
In a year where a little distraction is welcome, U.K. singer Beabadoobee rides a nostalgic wave of alt rock that permeates the listening consciousness as well as any new record of 2020. Her debut, Fake It Flowers, is Nineties nostalgia for the here and now. This is an album equally for people who binged MTV videos and Gen Z-ers that follow her on Instagram.
Beabadoobee is the performance moniker of Beatrice Laus. She is just 20 years old and already has the mojo of the Taylor Swift of garage rock. It does not take an extended listen to realize that she writes memorable songs filled with the right kind of angst.
Prior to the release of her first album, Beabadobee released a string of viral bedroom pop songs like “Coffee” and “If You Want To.” Laus had enough quality material to rebrand her prior work as an LP, but fans now have a new batch of music to listen to. She admirably eschewed those songs by crafting an entirely different collection of music in her debut. Fake It Flowers is filled with entirely fresh songs and not work from previous EPs. Hopefully, the non-album tracks are not lost over time because anthems like “I Wash I Was Stephen Malkmus” are evergreen.
She stays within the template of the songs in Fake It Flowers, but draws from a different area in her deep well of garage rock. The first track on Beabadobee’s new album is “Care,” a badass piece of music where she sings, “I don’t want your sympathy. Stop saying you give a shit. ‘Cause you don’t really…”
The empowering piece launches an album that is a mixed bag of emotions. She goes from closing the door on a past lover to a breakup track and eventually putting beer muscles in check in the span of the opening three songs. This sets up a range of feelings throughout the record that give a sneaky dynamic to Fake It Flowers.
Beabadobee’s debut is more than a Swift breakup record. Her songwriting persona is the total swirl of emotions ranging from romance to wistful thinking. This trove of songs comes to a head midway through the record. “Emo Song” is an aptly-named dreamy bit that sees the young singer pause and go into a deep dive as she blames a past love. It is one of several songs on the album that have the ability to transition into anthems for a younger audience feeling the same heartache.
The record is filled with music that is a graduation from her previous short, punchy garage work. It is more mainstream 90’s alt rock than a reliance on the exact same band-in-a-basement style. Beabadobee is an artist to watch (not just in 2020). If Fake It Flowers is a sign of things to come, her work may fill out much of the next decade for the daydreamers of Gen Z.
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About the Author: John Saeger is a music and film writer from Philadelphia. Since 2017 he has been writing his pop-culture blog Long After Dark, a site dedicated to the arts in the City
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