"SECRET LOVE" By Dry Cleaning

“Secret Love” captures Dry Cleaning at their most open and expressive, pairing Florence Shaw’s intimate, diary-like spoken delivery with a band that’s grown more melodic, playful, and emotionally direct. The song highlights the group’s evolution beyond rigid post-punk labels, revealing a chameleon-like band whose restless curiosity and human warmth continue to redefine their sound.(Rock)

It is hard to sing along to a Dry Cleaning song and the reasons go beyond the fact that their lead singer, Florence Shaw 's not really one for singing. Few songwriters give you open access to what is going on in their mind like Florence Shaw. Her songs are like talks that can jump from talking about everyday things to criticizing society to being completely silly all in one part of the song. Florence Shaw does all this while still sounding really calm like someone who hosts a podcast about being healthy and relaxed.

Dry Cleaning songs are, like this because of Florence Shaw. When you listen to the music it's like finding someones secret collection of private recordings that they made just for themselves. The music feels like notes that someone wrote down just to remember things. If you try to sing along to the music it would feel like you are being nosy and intrusive like you are reading someones diary. The music is like the persons thoughts and singing along to it would be, like invading their privacy.

Shaws way of singing is really straightforward. That is what holds everything together. This lets the people in the band like Tom Dowse on guitar, Lewis Maynard on bass and Nick Buxton on drums play around and try new things.

The band used to have a rough sound on their early songs but then they started making music that was more upbeat and fun like, on the album Stumpwork that came out in 2022. No matter what they do when Shaw sings it always sounds like Dry Cleaning. That is what makes their music special. Dry Cleanings relationship is like a movie director and the person who makes the music for the movie. They work together in a way.. On their new album Secret Love, which is their first album in three and a half years Dry Cleaning are doing things a bit differently. They are being more natural and working better. They are putting feeling into the songs. The songs have dramatic moments choruses that are really sung and fun parts where they talk back and forth. Dry Cleaning are really making the songs, on Secret Love come alive with Dry Cleanings sound. The bands music is always changing,. It is hard to put a label on it. The bands musical vision is getting bigger and bigger. A term like post-punk does not really fit the bands music because the band is always trying new things and changing their sound. The band is, like a chameleon they can sound like anything. Post-punk is not an enough term to describe the bands music. The bands music is too different and it keeps changing so we need a way to describe it. The band is always making music and trying new things that is what makes them so special.

Dry Cleaning has found a partner in Cate Le Bon with Secret Love. She is a musician from Wales who makes unique music. A lot of people want to work with her because she is very good at producing music. Cate Le Bon has her style and it is attracting other musicians who like to make music that is a little different.

When Cate Le Bon makes music she is very good at taking something that might seem cold and making it exciting. She does the thing, with Secret Love. Cate Le Bon and Secret Love are a team. Secret Love and Cate Le Bon work well together to make something. Life in the 2020s can be really scary. Sometimes it feels like the music of Geese with songs like "Theres a bomb in my car" is about being on edge and freaking out.. Dry Cleaning is different. They make music that's more about being scared of what is going on inside your own head. Dry Cleaning songs are like they are talking directly to your fears. Dry Cleaning is pretty good at making you think about your fears and worries rather than just freaking out about what is happening around you like the music of Geese does with their song about a bomb, in a car. The albums lead single "Hit My Head All Day" was released around the time as Getting Killed last fall. This song is about feeling down because of all the bad information everywhere. It is like an confusing ride. The music is slow and weird with strange guitar sounds, like something from Scary Monsters. There are also people chanting which sounds scary. The song "Hit My Head All Day" has a lot of sounds, like funk music but it is all mixed up. The guitar playing is really strange, like Robert Fripps style. The song "Hit My Head All Day" is trying to show how crazy the world can be. The song is over it is about two thirds of the way through the six minutes and then something cool happens. A bright and shiny synth line shows up it is like a flash of light. This synth line is like a call for help it is asking for a place to hide from all the crazy things that are happening in the song. The song is really chaotic and this synth line is trying to make it feel better it is, like a message that says everything will be okay.

When Shaw is not talking about the things she does to herself Shaw uses her voice to speak for people who do not really care about the things that happen in the world. On the music of "Cruise Ship Designer" the main character that Shaw is talking about tries to make us believe that making fun places on boats for rich people is a good thing to do. Shaws character thinks this is a way to make art while he waits for some of the money from rich people to come to him. Shaw is talking about people, like this. Maybe she is also talking about musicians who sign away their freedoms and livelihoods to the people in charge of the music industry for a smaller and smaller share of the money that the music industry makes.

Then there is the foodie from "Evil Evil Idiot" who worries a lot about their health. They write down everything they do to prepare their meals. They say things like "I like to burn my food" and "The flames clean the stuff, from plastic that gets on my food that is natural " Shaw says on a song that sounds like someone is making fun of Sleaford Mods and playing their music really slow. The song "Blood" starts with a lot of guitar playing like Johnny Marr. It is saying something about how people do not care about all the bad things they see on television like wars and people being hurt. We see these things all the time. Then our minds start to think about other things like moving to a new house. This happens to all of us when we really care about something our minds can wander to things, like what "Blood" is talking about.

Musically and thematically Secret Love is like a mix of different feelings. It goes from the cool sound of New Romanticism in "I Need You" to the really fun and confident sound of "The Cute Things". This song shows that Dry Cleaning is a band that is not afraid to learn from other great bands like the Rolling Stones. They are a -punk band but they do not mind taking ideas from other types of music. Secret Love is about Dry Cleaning and their music and Dry Cleaning is really good, at playing with different styles. The album Secret Love has a lot of styles and that is because of how it was made. Some of Secret Love was recorded at a studio in the Loire Valley in France. The darker and heavier songs on Secret Love were made in Dublin with the people from Gilla Band. They like to have fun and do things with their music. Some other songs on Secret Love were recorded at The Loft which's a studio in Chicago that belongs to the band Wilco. This place helped the music, on Secret Love sound warmer and more natural. Secret Love has a lot of sounds because of where it was recorded.

When you listen to those songs you can actually hear Dry Cleaning relaxing and having fun as they play. The song "My Soul/Half Pint" starts out as an angry song. Dry Cleaning is complaining about how men and women're not treated equally when it comes to cleaning the house.. Then they add some happy piano music, kind of like the song "Waiting for My Man" and Jeff Tweedy starts playing his guitar in a funny way. This makes the song turn into a song that you would hear in a bar. The singer, Shaw starts to sound happier and happier. She even jokes that maybe it is time for men to do the cleaning for a time like 500 years. Dry Cleaning is really letting loose on this song. When the guitar part in "Secret Love" gets going it sounds like Modest Mouse. Then it. The singing, in the chorus is really clear and sweet. It is like Shaw found something that she can do with her music something she did not know she could do before. She sings Secret Love in a way that's really nice to hear. The biggest breakthrough is this song called "Let Me Grow. You'll See the Fruit". At first it sounds like the song is about someone who does not like people. This person likes to stay alone and watch TV shows. They do not want anyone to bother them with phone calls or messages. The song has a melody with a saxophone. It is about someone who stays home a lot. Deep down they do not like being alone. The person in the song "Let Me Grow and You'll See the Fruit" is trying to convince people to leave them but it is clear they wish someone was with them. The song "Let Me Grow and You'll See the Fruit" is really, about being lonely.

The person singing in the song "Let Me Grow and You'll See the Fruit" is still stuck inside at the end of the song. Dry Cleaning is a band that used to be very strict with their music style, which is called post-punk.. Now Dry Cleaning has changed and become more open with their music. This song shows that Dry Cleaning is becoming more free and open which is a change, for the band Dry Cleaning. Dry Cleaning ends Secret Love with an indie rock song called "Joy". In this song Shaw says what she thinks will make life better: "It's a horrorland, Destruction Don't give up On being sweet". When she says the three words her strong voice gets a little softer like she is trying to follow her own advice. Then she sings the inviting part of the song that Dry Cleaning has ever made: "Joy We'll build a cute harmless world". Dry Cleaning is really good at making songs, like this. The song "Joy" is an example of what Dry Cleaning does best. Shaw’s vision of utopia may still be a distant fantasy, but it starts to feel a little more real when everyone can sing along.

Mason Morgan