Francesca Pidgeon is no stranger to accolades from Silent Radio. She is part of BC Camplight’s band who were recipients of our album of 2023 for ‘The Last Rotation of Earth’. Her new album as Dilettante, ‘Life of the Party’, makes an early claim for recognition on our 2025 list. It is a record inspired by the tribulations of turning 30 with its pressures to conform and settle down. The notes that accompany the album suggest that Pidgeon does not see herself as an accomplished musician on the multiple instruments used on the record, more as a dilettante or dabbler. However, while she might not be able to play Rachmaninov or Charlie Parker note perfect, the approach works ideally for producing the twelve imaginatively constructed pop songs that constitute ‘Life of the Party’.
The range of instrumentation played by Pidgeon on the opening track, ‘Fun’, is indicative of the very busy nature of her songs (synth, acoustic guitar, nylon guitar, electric guitar, melodica, clarinet, alto sax, tenor sax, percussion, flute and additional drums.) She dubbed it as their “feel bad hit of the summer.” Its subject matter is not having a good time in situations where the emphasis on enjoyment becomes unbearable, such as birthdays and parties. For a song about not having fun, it is incredibly enjoyable. It has a rhythmic lightness while utilising some unorthodox percussion (coffee mugs, radiators) reminiscent of Tune-Yards and is riddled with hooks, especially on the deranged backing vocals about having a breakdown which mimic that emotion. Throw in some nimble bass from Aaron Collins-Wood to create an absolute winner.
‘Easy Does It’ recalls prime St Vincent in the way sax and synth lead a slightly off-kilter groove. Again, it marries pure pop with something more tangled while the lyrics see Pidgeon attempting to remind herself to revel in her good fortune but ending up in a conflicted place. Inspired by a rereading of Milan Kundera’s ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’, ‘Stone’ weighs up issues of weight and light, whether to buy or borrow things, the necessity or otherwise of having pets and kids, commitment versus remaining single and decision paralysis. Its musical genesis came from hitting an empty peach can while working out percussion parts which is indicative of how her creative approach works with inspiration coming from the unlikeliest sources, before being piled on top of each other to produce a carefully arranged chaos.
‘To Make Me Good’ has a more relaxed pace and a simplistic beginning with big bass slides. Some woozy piano takes the song in a dreamy direction while the lyrics dabble in the pressures to settle down and being worn down by the life of a self-employed musician, contemplating needing someone “to tell me when to go to bed… to brush my hair and hold my hand.”
‘Twice As Clean’ is derived from messing around on a sample pad and finding an aggressive 808 sound that is pitched around. There is also a digital arpeggio and lots of fun harmonising on another song that wanders waywardly yet is deeply satisfying. In contrast, ‘In the Taxi’ is an unrequited love song with a laidback, lounge-like feel. Part of it is taken from an old demo and the song is arranged to have Pidgeon singing along with a 2019 version of herself.
A mix of Nilsson and Sondheim, ‘Cake’ has an attractive circular piano melody and sax rolling around her vocals, sees her being “too strong to admit when I’m capricious” and, aptly enough, is about wanting to have her cake and eat it in terms of relationships. Even by the standards of this album, the arrangement to ‘My Toothpaste Ajar’ is incredible. Words are crammed together in an unusual set of shifting tempos, creating a fluttering feeling akin both to falling in love and passing out. The failure to put the top back on a tube of toothpaste serves as a metaphor for the difficulties in maintaining a relationship.
While it can be seen as a pastiche of an old show tune, ‘I’m In Love With Falling In Love’ has heart to it, an expression of disappointment in her inability to stick at relationships (“I’m in love with whoever’s nearest / But as soon as someone else looks my way / My knees will buckle.”) The arrangement built around piano, saxes, clarinet and French horn is gorgeous. Starting out with the intention of being a country tune, ‘Honey’ ends up in a totally different place with its sassy chorus and infectious hooks while its lyrics tackle being brought down by the unwanted attentions of men wanting to change her.
The titular track is loaded with irony in its title as it is a tale of social awkwardness, neurodivergence and masking. It reflects the need for controlled social interactions and how for her the easiest way of communication is through writing songs (as someone whose most comfortable means of interaction is by writing reviews, I can easily empathise.) It is the song with the album’s most muted feel. The record finishes with ‘The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of’, inspired by Twin Peaks and full of stacked clarinets and drones which create a positively dreamy ending to an extraordinary record that pitches lyrical honesty with great musical imagination.
Dilettante: Life of the Party – Out 24 January 2025 (Launchpad+/ EMI North)
I was editor of the long-running fanzine, Plane Truth, and have subsequently written for a number of publications. While the zine was known for championing the most angular independent sounds, performing in recent years with a community samba percussion band helped to broaden my tastes so that in 2021 I am far more likely to be celebrating an eclectic mix of sounds and enthusing about Made Kuti, Anthony Joseph, Little Simz and the Soul Jazz Cuban compilations as well as Pom Poko and Richard Dawson.
