Cassie Ramone seems to appear and disappear, something like a medieval ghost or something. Sometimes she’ll appear and release a limited 7-inch and then sometimes she’ll reunite Vivian Girls. Her recent appearance was kind of shocking because she both reunited the Babies and released a brand new LP.
And that was even more surprising because, wherein her previous albums have been lo-fi, solo affairs, her new album is a lush, full on, full band affairs (even if the full band is just her and Kevin Morby playing seven instrument between them).
Well, here’s why Cassie Ramone sightings are so sporadic- because when she does go full on, full album, full band, the release is always so cosmically heavy I can’t take it AND they are always so frikkin good. Sweetheart is so frikkin good.
To a degree, the album bears Ramone’s trademark sound- reverbed out, ethereal sound, tinged with homages to ‘60s girl groups and ‘80s indie rock… and maybe some alien references. Yet, what is so striking about Sweetheart is how lush and full and bright and… happy… thre album is (even if it still has sad undertones).
Ramone, perhaps more than ever, references her ‘60s inspirations on the title track and “together.” But, of course, it’s not just pure homage. Sure, she’s singing love songs built around a classic pop structure, but then she lays on layer after layer of fuzzed out, spaced out weirdness. “Sweetheart” for example, starts out nice and lovey dovey before titling into a sinister rumble. The opening track, “I’m going home,” starts out as a melting demo before warping into a huge, booming track, all while Ramone laments what’s she’s lost. She says “I’m going home and never leaving again / I’m going home because I am my only friend.”
Ramone has a particular knack for importing massive meaning onto apparently simple lines, all while leaving room for mystery. On Running dry,” she talks about thinking she is heaven but seems to be in distress- you fit the contrast together. Few artists can conjure emotion along with unanswered questions as simply as delicately as Ramone. Also, I love the slamming guitar that jumps out halfway through the song. Writers (including myself) like to reference Ramone’s golden age of music inspirations, but we often neglect to mention how nasty and scary and mean her guitar can sound and how she can fashion the instrument into something entirely alien to the “guitar.” Who else can conjure sounds of love and horror and isolation and joy with a bend like Cassie?
The production here also plays an important point. It’s probably Ramone’s most lush recording to date- “Joy to the world” has a soaring synth exploration that Hawkwind would die for. So, here, Ramone and Morby embrace the Phil Spector wall of sound and create an album that sounds huge, but is still deeply personal and frankly, delicate. The way the title track grows from a bedroom demo to a thundering, layered crescendo is soul shaking. I’m not kidding.
Sweetheart feels like the culmination of Ramone’s previous decade. Many of her victories and defeats are tied together into this monumental, twisting, strange statement. It’s big. It’s broad. It’s personal. It’s daring. It deliberately veers of course here and there. It’s sweet. It’s threatening. It’s really, really, really good. It’s a masterpiece and I don’t mind saying so. Let’s hope she doesn’t disappear for a while.