Tag: Better

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Penguin Prison Releases an Upbeat and Hopeful New Banger

Chris Glover is a New York-based multi-instrumentalist, singer/songwriter and electro pop artist best known as Penguin Prison. With Penguin Prison, Glover has a critically applauded discography that includes 2011’s self-titled debut and 2015’s Lost In New York — and a handful of viral hits including “Don’t Fuck With My Money,” “Show Me The Way” and RAC’s “Hollywood.” Additionally, Glover has released acclaimed remixes of Lana Del Rey, Ellie Goulding, and Imagine Dragons.

Glover’s latest Penguin Prison single “Better” is the first bit of new material from the acclaimed pop artist since last year’s “The Heat.” Beginning with a arpeggiated piano and soulful vocal-led intro with the quick addition of layered harmony, handclaps and shimmering synths, the track turns into a rousingly anthemic banger with the addition a sinuous bass line, Nile Rodgers-like funk guitar and an even more uptempo, two-step inducing groove. Subtly nodding at soul and gospel spirituals, the song was written with the direct intention of uplifting listeners and inspiring them to hold on to the hope of a better world — even if it’s just for the duration of a fun pop song. Honestly, considering the dire state of everything, the song offers a necessary escape, as all great pop songs inevitably do.

“This song is my response to the times we find ourselves in,” Glover explains. “The global pandemic, social injustice, climate change; it’s overwhelming. I wanted to write about rising above it all. I want the listener to feel hopeful that we can find a way to get through even if it’s just for the duration of the song.”


Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Politically Charged Visuals for Soto Voce’s “Better”

The duo’s debut single “Better” was quietly released and within a few weeks of its release, the track grabbed the attention of the blogosphere for a brooding, cinematic difficult to pigeonhole track that many of my colleagues have described with Sade-fronting Radiohead comparisons. And while being a bit reductionist, I think that what a lot of my colleagues have missed is that the song possesses a deeply personal and aching plea for acceptance, both within and without, in which De Vivo’s vocals manage to be sensual and aggressive within a turn of a phrase are paired with a production that alternate between moody atmospherics and club-banging, propulsive cascades of shimmering synths.

Although the video was specifically made as a comment on the deeply troubling and unsettling times we live in, complete around tensions around Black Lives Matter, Transgender and LGBTQ rights and fears of greater global unrest have reached boiling points, the video manages to not just be timely but serves as a fitting description of how uncertain things seem for minority groups around the world and how close to our destruction we actually are. As the duo’s Kenny Soto explains of the video ” In the video, I’m visualizing [sic] some really dark images, or maybe they’re being broadcasted to me. It depends on your perception. I’m watching people being desecrated and killed, crosses being burned. There comes a point when the car stops and Miguel steps out to open the door. I’m handcuffed, and he pushes me into a grave, and I come out on the other side another version of myself. For us the Black Lives Matter stuff, of course that’s something that becomes relevant [now], and it wasn’t necessarily we made it for that in any way. But it obviously is relevant to the current , and culture in general. Then the gender stuff as well, and both of those things kind of tie in and maybe being seen as worthless.”