Death Becomes Her

On Death Becomes Her, Angel-Ho beautifully transmutes any past anguish into a colorful network of global sonics, a bold statement of trans femininity, and a rallying cry for resistance. At once, Angel-Ho shatters binaries and encompasses dualities.

The production has remained faithfully jagged and abrasive, where a trebly and bass-starved sonic narrative enforces a fresh take on what continues to be intense and difficult listening. [Apr 2019, p.50]

The debut full-length just introduced her voice, and so, there is much more to be discovered. And, regardless of whether Angel-Ho commits to becoming a pop star, reverts to being a producer, or, most likely, maintains both abilities, her voice matters.

Death Becomes Her is an album from an artist who in now beginning to realise her possibilities, not just as a producer but as a performer, and as such she wants to get everything out there, squeezing every last idea into the album. And sometimes her take on pop music might be a little too abrasive to reach the playlists of many a commercial pop station… for now.

In its finest moments, it demonstrates the potency of experimental club music--dynamic, disorderly and charged with emotion. Sadly, a chunk of tracks amount to more of an endurance test, one which some listeners will simply nope out of.

Where the artist's past work used abstract sound as a conceptual approach to trans identity, the choice to embrace lyricism makes Death Becomes Her a more fun and digestible listen.

The results are anything but fluid, instead capturing the lawless, conflicting thrills of cultural anarchy. [Apr 2019, p.110]