On Softscars: Yeule Brings Out the Inherent Humanity in Artifice
Graphic by Julia Norkus
By Bennett Himmel
For nearly a decade, London-based artist Yeule has been making detached ambient pop from the perspective of either an AI who’s starting to feel a little too real or a human being that’s becoming a little too online. On their 2022 record Glitch Princess, they opened with a monologue, their voice glitching as they sputtered, “I like making up my own worlds / And the people who live inside me.” Yeule represents an interesting figure in the hyperpop canon. They are clearly very smart, intensely committed to living out their art and character, yet their music tends to fall a little bit flat for me.
Yeule’s voice was often cloaked in Grimes-esque reverb and Charli XCX-like autotune and placed over pillowy, crystalline synths and muffled house beats, the songs consistently threaten to explode but rarely do so. On paper, this shouldn’t pose an issue for me— Grimes and Charli are two artists I hold in very high regard and I tend to love soft pop music that bubbles under the surface. However, in the case of Yeule, while I found their cyborg concept, visual aesthetics, and sonic vibes incredibly enticing, their songwriting sometimes disappointed me. Yeule is a lyricist who tends to work in little couplets—tiny, wry, oft gory one-two punches that usually elicit a chuckle, but occasionally, an eye roll. “I'm sorry I don't feel good / I'm sorry I'm not so keen on food / But don't tell me about my fate / Don't tell me about my weight” is harrowing, sure, but perhaps a bit on the nose.
On their latest record Softscars, Yeule made some major changes. While their previous albums have been synth-heavy pop music, their new record is undeniably a guitar album. The entire album is a huge ‘90s rock throwback, as indebted to Slowdive as it is to Avril Lavigne.
Opener “x w x” is a raucous banger, with Yeule’s voice taking on a whinier, raspier, overall more emo sound, but still dripping with autotune and the effect is intoxicating. “Pretty boy psycho, sicko boy psycho / Let me guess, let me know, borderline overdose,” they groan. Lyrically, not much has changed, but sonically, this is an entirely new palette that informs their emo-kid poetry much more comfortably.
Much of Softscars deals in sentience. In essence, it’s a collection of love songs from someone who is learning how to feel and open up. This is a concept that can resonate with many people, however Yeule puts their own cybernetic spin on it. Soft ballad “ghosts” is a collection of silk-sheet sweet nothings, “I was in love with a pop star / Crumbling down over bloodshot crushed eyes / I was impressed by his fucking / Like in movies, all in bloom, break the camera,” but builds to a climax where many elements of the mix drop out, the autotune intensifies, and a soft breeze is passed through Yeule’s vocals— “If only I could be…real enough to love.”
The title track is a sweaty, lightly horny piece of dream pop, containing my favorite couplet of the record: “You stabbed me right in the chest / You made me bleed, you made me wet!”
You can practically hear the smirk in Yeule’s voice.
At its core, this is a “I’m In Love With The Bad Boy” song, but something about Yeule’s turns of phrase and breathy robotic vocals make the song feel intentionally uncanny, like a robot gone rogue.
The record is a little bit frontloaded. Most of the singles are towards the beginning, and they are probably the best tracks on the album. After the pretty, but ultimately unnecessary interlude “fish in the pool,” things slowly decline. The last truly fantastic song being the slow-burning “Software Update,” containing one of the most honest lines on the record, “Twenty-five, traumatized / painting white on my eyes.” It’s a moment when Yeule completely forgoes character, something we’ve never really seen before. It’s the most human line on the album and it’s ironically on what is probably the most robotic track.
The album’s final stretch is smart sequencing— they throw in one final banger, “cyber meat”, that would be insanely fun if not for some slightly trite, teenagery lyrics—although I feel that may be the point of this track—then end on a soft note with “aphex twin flame.” The song is an effective closer sonically, it’s beautiful, but doesn’t really contain any sort of thesis statement for the record, no “moral of the story”.
But the real thesis statement for Softscars—and Yeule’s career as a whole— is found on shoegaze-infected cut “4ui12.” The point is made with two simple words: “Art, artificially.”
Nothing seems to fascinate Yeule more than the digital age and A.I.. They once stated in an interview that they at one point considered having their social media continue to algorithmically update after their death. Yeule is intensely interested in serving something incredibly, undeniably human through an uncanny lens. Softscars is their most interesting, human and ultimately best work to date—but the ghost isn’t out of the shell yet.
★★★★