Hailing from Toronto, LIGHTS is formerly Valerie Poxleitner; a girl who cooled off Warped Tour-goers with her light hearted synth-driven melodies and pop-ballads, while toting a keytar. At the age of 22, LIGHTS has come far from sitting in her room creating music, already gaining much attention in her home of Canada, and will soon by next year will be entering the American airwaves. LIGHTS is on a mission to brighten up the dark world, and on her self-titled EP, she definitely is successful.
LIGHTS is a six-song release that can be described as radio ready power-pop with a dash of New Wave-y synth. “Ice”, the first song off of the EP is an uplifting head bopper that features a LIGHTS delivering a brief rap, which has her making a shout out to the 80s generation of music that has shaped her, finishing off with an “Ice, Ice Baby!”
However, “Ice” stands out like a sore thumb among the dreamy-pop tracks proceeding it, like on the breathy “Drive My Soul” and “February Air”, songs that might warm you up from the imaginable lighters and cell-phones being held up. However, breathy dream-pop may be just what LIGHTS does best, rather than dance-floor crazy songs like ‘Ice”.
In a way, LIGHTS can be considered a more up-lifting and poppier version of another dream-pop outfit; M83, if M83 was the brainchild of a adolescent girl. Her vocal harmonies paired with powerful synths create new wave numbers that will have you confused on whether to move your body or take in the dreamy quality of her music. Without a doubt, LIGHTS is someone who can definitely brighten up anybody’s dark world. The only obstacle standing in LIGHT’S would be trying not to create a sameness among her music; her songs ending up all sounding the same, which can be tricky when you’re armed with only your voice and keyboard.
But if this self-titled EP is just a small preview of what’s to come on her upcoming full-length, then that should be no problem for her to avoid.
Review by Norrel Blair
[RATING: 4/5]
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