That is, more or less, what happens on *Vitamins*, the debut single from Brighton’s Cello, and it is, frankly, one of the more startling introductions this writer has encountered in some time.<\/p>
Cello \u2014 the artist previously known, in other institutions, as a conservatoire-trained cellist who passed through the hallowed corridors of the Junior Royal College of Music \u2014 has, with evident glee, chucked her practice scores into the nearest skip and arrived in post-punk minimalism like someone who has spent years being polite and has abruptly decided to stop. The classical training hasn’t gone anywhere, mind you. It simply manifests differently here: not in flourish or ornamentation, but in the rigorous economy of the thing, the understanding that tension comes from control, and that silence \u2014 strategic, deliberate \u2014 is its own kind of loudness.<\/p>
The track itself is deceptively lean. Built on a hypnotic, locked groove, it operates on the logic of accumulation: each lyrical obligation piled atop the last like items on a cursed domestic invoice. *I’ll do my homework. I’ll be a good girl. I’ll do the housework. I’ll do your therapy. I’ll do my workout.* The delivery is deadpan \u2014 almost serene \u2014 which is precisely what gives it its edge. There is no wailing, no theatrical catharsis. Only the slow, inexorable pressure of a woman demonstrating, with forensic patience, exactly what is expected of her. And then: *Why don’t you give them to me?*<\/span><\/p> That line. It’s the question the whole track has been building toward, and it lands with the quiet devastation of a door clicked softly shut. What are the vitamins? Everything, apparently. Validation. Agency. The basic nutrients of being treated as a full human being rather than a productivity surface with acceptable aesthetic qualities.<\/span><\/p> The chorus \u2014 *Vitamins, vitamins, yeah yeah* \u2014 is simultaneously euphoric and hollow, a chant that could belong to an aerobics class or a protest march, possibly both. It is the sound of wellness culture consuming itself. One is reminded, fleetingly, of early Sleater-Kinney, of Wire at their most stripped and sarcastic, of the Raincoats distilling female experience into something that resists sentiment while being entirely full of feeling. Cello is not derivative of any of them. She simply occupies the same tradition of women who understood that the minimalist form, far from being cold, is the most efficient vessel for controlled rage.<\/span><\/p> Released on International Women’s Day \u2014 a date that could have been crass but here feels earned \u2014 *Vitamins* is the opening salvo from a forthcoming album titled *Kung Fu Disco*, which is either the best or the second-best album title this year, and either way suggests an artist who is absolutely not playing it safe. Good. Safe is for people who have been given their vitamins. The rest of us are still waiting.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
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