Oh Baby – Cruel Intention

In a 2017 blog post, Patrick Metzger coined the phrase ‘Nostalgia Pendulum’ to describe the process by which old things are reimagined and made new again. The theory posits that it takes around 3 decades for trends to complete one full cycle – from novelty, to mainstream, to passé, then back to novelty again. The theory has some compelling data to support it, not least in the absurd shape of the 2014 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles remake. However, if there’s one trend that refuses to go with the pendulum’s swing, it’s 80s New Wave.

Nicholas Winding Refn’s 2011 film Drive rekindled an interest in the fizz, whistle, and clatter of synthpop, and since then the sound has steadily edged itself back into the mainstream. We might call it The New Wave of New New Wave, and this is the context in which we meet Oh Baby’s latest single Cruel Intention.

It must be remembered that 80s New Wave was a far more sonically diverse genre than we now give it credit for, and Oh Baby clearly have no interest in pulling up a generic Casio plugin and calling it a day. The overall sound is closer to Visage than to Duran Duran, with synths that throb menacingly behind a brittle drum machine. Jen Devereux sings in an authentically affectless voice, but the song is surprisingly light on vocal effects. A splash of reverb here and there and some ghostly harmonies on the hook are all Cruel Intention allows. This is a bold production choice, and it turns out to be Oh Baby’s shrewdest move. The minimalist approach allows Duvereux’s voice enough space to bloom without ever leaving it sounding naked. ‘I knew you would, I knew you would,’ she shrugs on the pre-chorus, before pirouetting to the hook with self-conscious grace. And yet – and appropriately for a song that explores doomed love and faces behind faces – there’s the nagging sense that we’re being kept at arm’s length. The instrumental seems to exist in a perpetual state of unresolved tension – but for a short bridge, the steady pulse of the bass endures throughout – with Duvereux at its centre, a tantalisingly unknowable presence.

According to Metzger, we should all emerge from lockdown draped in oversized lumberjack flannels and acid-wash ripped jeans. On Cruel Intention, Oh Baby whisper for us to not let the synths go without a fight.

Christopher R. Moore