Last year, Julien Baker unveiled her stunning studio album Little Oblivions, which was followed by a remix EP featuring Half Waif, Gordi, Thao, and Jesu. She’s back today, right before she kicks off a tour with Angel Olsen and Sharon Van Etten, with an EP of B-sides from that LP.
The EP is three tracks: the previously released “Guthrie,” and the brand new “Vanishing Point” and “Mental Math.” The songs are as vulnerable and visceral as you’d expect, with intense imagery and unfiltered feeling: “Hanging on a ledge, outside of your house / Trying not to freak out, staring at the ground / Doing math in my head, how far is it down? / Not too good to beg for you to try to talk me down,” she lulls over twinkly guitars.
About themes that often come up in her lyricism, Baker told Uproxx, “I always talk about it in the context of not being able to accept love because it’s almost more painful for a person to show you graciousness or mercy when you know that you have failed or hurt them in some way. I find myself, often, wishing for punishment because that would make sense in my brain.”
Listen to “Vanishing Point” above and “Mental Math” below.