Spellling’s queer power ballad manages to be ethereal, euphoric and anthemic all at the same time, and crosses as many musical boundaries.
There’s something of ’80s icons like Pat Benatar, Belinda Carlisle and Cyndi Lauper about the way Spellling – Chrystia “Tia” Cabral – belts out the tune against that lush musical accompaniment, emotion and drama pushed to the max.
I especially love the drum pattern, which reminds me of the style of The National’s Bryan Devendorf – and the part where the rhythm breaks down and distorts.
Spellling looks as if she’s having the time of her life (even before she’s got fully dressed). And like all good songs, its refrain – “I don’t belong here” – can be interpreted in several ways: about gender, sexuality, race or even music itself.
It’s quite a change of direction for Cabral, whose first self-released album, Pantheon Of Me, was a much more theatrical affair that reminded me strongly of Kate Bush.
That was in 2017; subsequently signed to Sacred Bones Records, she followed it up with two more albums in similar vein, Mazy Fly, and The Turning Wheel, both with dark and eerie undertones.
Born in the California capital of Sacramento, Cabral turned to music after she moved to Oakland to study at UCL Berkeley, studying philosophy, where she says she was “shamed” out of the course for her sexuality and colour.
Switching to English Lit and graduating with a Master of Fine Arts, she began working as a primary school teacher before launching her musical career in 2015 following the death of a close friend.
If her style is eclectic, that’s little surprise from someone who named her favourite three albums as Minnie Riperton’s Come To My Garden, Kraftwerk’s Computer World and The Idiot by Iggy Pop.