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Music

SOPHIE Finally Released a New Song, "Lemonade," and It's as Maddeningly Catchy as You'd Expect

SOPHIE has a new song, and now we're thirsty as hell.

SOPHIE, the playful, maddening British electronic experimentalist, has a way of stoking thirst and then quenching it just enough. When I saw him live earlier this year, he'd let loose these gleeful bursts of twisted pop music before settling into a couple minutes of drone, seemingly while he chose a new song to play. He teases the media by being coy about pictures and interviews and by releasing songs at the frustratingly slow pace of around two a year. SOPHIE is annoying as shit, but then you get a brief glimpse, a taste of what he's holding back, and it can make you feel better.

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SOPHIE's songs are catchy against all reason, which is why the mere mention of his name is enough to get "Bipp" stuck in my head and why I instantly knew his latest song, "Lemonade," even though I'd heard it exactly one other time, played live, late at night, more than two months ago. The song struts along in a sort spoken-word hopscotch rhyme cadence before bursting into a high-pitched pop chorus. This part sounds like some forgotten single by an anonymous, manufactured early 2000s pop group: "I've got something to tell you/Hope you'll understand/I never meant to hurt you/It wasn't in my plans/It's just that when I'm with you/Everything's okay/I get that fizzy feeling/And I want lemonade." How does it do this? How can music so instantly feel so familiar? I have no clue, but now I'm both thirsty as hell and partially quenched. The subliminal cues are out of control here. The infuriating cycle continues. Goddammit. Listen to "Lemonade" below: