When people talk about “lo-fi” these days, they’re probably not talking about Daniel Johnston, or early Smog cassettes. While “lo-fi” generally refers to any music recorded with low fidelity, it’s most commonly used nowadays to refer to “lo-fi hip-hop”: dreamy downtempo beats with a cozy sort of atmosphere. They’re often compiled in YouTube videos or streams, which aim to evoke a certain time and place – studying at three in the morning, for instance, or walking home in autumn. This is all well and good, and there are some genuinely lovely lo-fi beats. However, a genre with such a low barrier for entry, coupled with viral popularity, means a lot of chaff to sift through. Eventually, study music, coffee shop music, city music, and winter music all start to sound the same: like Nujabes, if he put in one-twentieth of the effort.
“Memory,” a new song by Lala Lala (aka Lillie West), is not lo-fi hip-hop; in fact, it’s not hip-hop at all. The first half of the song consists of drifting, delicate ambient pop, while the second half adds a drum beat for a fast-paced, danceable finish. But it does feature a few common elements that are typical of the genre: reverb-drenched piano chords, crisp drums, and a preoccupation with memory and nostalgia. There’s even a chipmunk-soul vocal sample, not quite decipherable, that pops in every now and then. West, however, isn’t just looking to relax the listener; she’s after something more thoughtful than that.
West adds a big, swelling synth at the start of the song, and while it never quite drowns out the rest of the music, its presence is always felt. It’s of a piece with the lyrics, which deal with the persistence of memory. “All the things I gave away,” West sings, in a husky, woozy contralto. “Still remember how they taste/Like a video of summer/Watching heat on someone’s face.” It’s a lovely, specific bit of imagery, and if she mixes the metaphors a bit, well, memory has a way of making one thing bleed into another.
A lot of music, explicitly or implicitly, deals with nostalgia; through their music or their lyrics, they try to return to what once was but has since ceased to be. As our culture grows more and more obsessed with what’s comfortable and familiar, this has grown more prevalent. But “Memory” is about how damaging that impulse can be. West views these memories, even the sun-soaked vision of summer at the start, as “a curse”, and towards the end of the song she describes what these memories can do to someone. “Lost in the fight/they lose all their wanting/their ego destroys/their visions are blurring.” West suggests a world of lotus eaters, so desperate to reclaim the past that they forget about the future.
