Frankie Rose

Frankie Rose has spent the last few years looking for her voice — after her Girls in the Garage-influenced debut with the Outs, she struck synth-pop gold with last year's shimmering, if somewhat uneven, Interstellar. Herein Wild picks up where that record left off, expanding Rose's sonic palette. "Sorrow" is the most immediate link between the two albums. Elsewhere, "Cliffs as High" is a grandiose ballad, complete with sweeping strings, while "the Depths" finds the singer/guitarist channelling Bauhaus and the Cure, circa Pornography. There was never a doubt that Rose knew her way around a pop hook, a skill fully on display here. Holding Rose back, however, is her reticence to be the album's focal point. Rather than forming its through line, her vocals float in and out, à la Elizabeth Fraser. Thankfully, it's her relentless musical alchemy that anchors the album, which finally finds Rose being herself, rather than attempting to sound like someone else.