Eat This Music doesn’t generally cover EP releases, but I am a fan of Ninajirachi and truly believe her sophomore EP “Blumiere” deserves full exposure! So here we are.
Eat This Music had the opportunity to have a chat with Ninajirachi back in April when she released her single “Cut The Rope” prior to the release of the EP; since then though, Ninajirachi went on to release the title track, “Blumiere” in May and a brand new lyric video today for one of the other tracks on the EP, titled ‘Alight‘.
Ninajirachi worked on this EP over a six-month period towards the tail end of 2019 to the start of 2020, Ninajirachi’s ongwriting, mixing and production abilities have become more refined in this period and this EP reflects all her hard work.
“I would’ve done it sooner, it was just a matter of building confidence. I’ve worked closely with some amazing singers over the last year or two and learning to produce and mix vocals helped me realise that they’re just another instrument in an arrangement – I just needed to get over myself and give it a go.” — Ninajirachi on using her own vocals for the first time in her single “Cut The Rope”.
When Eat This Music interviewed Ninajirachi back in April, she told us, “I just need to cut the rope”, as in between her and that person. Although Ninajirachi realised it was a cool song title at the time when creating the single, the song isn’t about that [cutting a rope], it is just where the title came from. Most of the lyrics in the song are whatever words sounded cool to Ninajirachi at the time. At first, though, Ninajirachi thought it felt super alien and cringeworthy to use her own vocals in one of her own songs, however, she is used to the sound of her own voice and felt good about it.
Going deeper into the creative aspect of one of the prominent songs off the EP, “Cut The Rope”, Ninajirachi explained to Eat This Music at the time that she recalls making the bassline first, featuring that growly Reese bass that you hear at the start of the track. Ninajirachi then built chords from that and those two parts sounded nice together – which is evident in the piece. At the time of creating the song, Ninajirachi was doing vocal freestyles over what she had produced and stitching the best chops into a competent melody, then finding words that fit the vowels followed; and syllables too. Initially, though, Ninajirachi thought the melodic parts of the song didn’t fit the drop at all and that they should be two different songs, but Ninajirachi showed her friends the song and those friends convinced her she could make it work.
Moving on to the other songs on the EP though, “Alight”, is a song that pairs stream-of-consciousness lyricism with Ninajirachi’s airy over-arching vocals and manipulates the production around the world of sound she has created. The anthem sees Ninajirachi looking inward towards herself, revealing, “it was the first time I’d been able to transcribe my feelings into music with such accuracy and honesty”.
Other songs on the EP include, “Rainbow Train”, which fulfils the club quota for the record; and finally, one of the coolest tracks on the EP is “Tethered To The Body”, it is completely different to every other song on the EP, as it showcases a downtempo slow-burner, reminiscences of an acoustic pop anthem, before quickly moving into the direction of frantic madness. It is beautifully chaotic in a nice way.
