Rating: 4.5/5 stars

American singer-songwriter Caroline Polachek (“Pang”) released her fourth studio album “Desire, I Want to Turn Into You” on Feb. 14.

Back in January, Polachek tweeted that she was “endlessly f—ing annoyed” by being labeled as the Gen Z Kate Bush (“Hounds of Love”). Twitter ridiculed this tweet for its bold attempt at self-aggrandizement during a promotional cycle, but Polachek’s new album proves how such a comparison is indeed false. If anything, Polachek is more like Björk (“Fossora”), both having come from a celebrated indie band (The Sugarcubes; Chairlift) and embarked on an even more acclaimed solo effort (“Debut”; “Pang”) without the buffer period of “finding their sound.” Polachek did not need to find her niche, because she was born with it: her sirenic voice is the reverse of the AI debate, something so seemingly technical but genuinely human. Combine this with her and Danny L Harle’s (“Harlecore’’) ethereal yet eclectic pop production and you get the unique Polachek sound.

“Desire, I Want to Turn Into You” is not the next “Hounds of Love,” “Homogenic,” or even the next “Ray of Light”; it’s the next Caroline Polachek. “Desire” overall builds upon the art-pop precedent of “Pang” by incorporating ideas from ‘90s and 2000s electronica, particularly trip-hop.

After an anthemic opener with the single “Welcome to My Island,” “Pretty In Possible,” the first new song on the tracklist, kicks off the body of the album with a pouncing drum beat and a super catchy vocal hook of da-da-DA-das. The track sounds like a sped-up remix of classic Massive Attack (“Mezzanine”). 

Grimes (“Shinigami Eyes”) and Dido (“Still On My Mind”) separately seem like odd features for a Polachek song, but both together on “Fly to You” appears incredibly bizarre. In practice, it works better than you think, but their contributions’ are brief and feel phoned-in. This does not distract from the brilliance of the track, however. “Fly to You” is Polachek dabbling in rapid breakbeats, like all three singers are breaking the sound barrier in the name of love.

“Hopedrunk Everlasting” is an interesting track. It has an abstract, dreamy atmosphere built with minimalist production and lush layers of Polachek’s immaculate vocals (as well as a quirky smoke detector sample). Polachek’s influences and contemporaries all gravitate towards the “art-pop” label, but one can listen to this track and conceive another: “post-pop,” as in the pop/non-rock version of “post-rock.” 

This sonic venture continues with “Butterfly Net.” On an album about the liberatory feeling of desire, “Butterfly Net” is about the nearly-impossible act of capturing something so intangible, like “stupid ashes.” The song melds psychedelia and folktronica with a retro organ solo and a crisp acoustic guitar. The sound is so modernly Floydian that one can picture the possibility of Polachek covering “The Great Gig in the Sky,” but for now only in dreams.

The album closes on what was the best single of the previous year, “Billions.” Polachek sings of surreal imagery: headless angels, being dangled in cables and pulled by oysters. The cosmic production features a flailing, clinking beat with Polachek’s layered, angelic vocals. These elements coalesce like the inside of a space shuttle reaching zero-gravity. The song builds up to a burst of polyphony from the Trinity Croydon children’s choir, repeating, “I’ve never felt so close to you.” The track is evidence of Polachek’s goal: she has not simply evoked desire, but transformed into it. 

“Desire, I Want to Turn Into You” is Polachek once again proving that she resists all expectations. Harle’s PC Music cred lends itself to an exciting and unpredictable album.

Image from Caroline Polachek via YouTube