By Ally Fisher
A melodic indie-pop dream, Heard It In A Past Life by Maggie Rogers is an album all about self-love, discovery and learning about who you really are. Rogers, who is most notoriously known for her rise to fame by none other than Pharrell, has finally released her debut album after several EPs.
Feigning influences such as Fleetwood Mac, Haim and Lorde, Heard It In A Past Life is a wonderful, emotional and, dare I say it, groovy album made for dancing, crying and reflection.
The album starts with a contagious bass line which opens the gates for Rogers’ consonant-adverse indie vocals – making it just hard enough to understand her – but the backing synthesizer and twangy guitars of “Give A Little” drive the true essence of the album, leaving Rogers’s articulation in second place: get up and dance, shake off the weight of your demons.
But, what got Rogers’ discovered wasn’t just her production or mixing, it was her raspy-indie vocals that fall in the vein of Stevie Knicks or Florence Welch. On “Past Life,” she strips it back to just her and a piano, with resonating opening lyrics, “I can feel the change a-coming/Felt it in the breeze,” speaking powerful prose to overcoming the strangles of moving on and mental health, “Maybe there’s a past life coming/Out inside of me.”
Older fans will be pleased to hear the familiarities of EP tracks “Alaska,” and “On+Off” on the album as well.
Overall, Heard It In A Past Life is fun, heart-warming, contagious and a melodic listen full of catchy chords, high energy, and lyrics about loving yourself which hey, don’t we all need a little self-love from time to time?
