Titanic
Hagen LP (Unheard of Hope)
In her sensational 1929 biography Tiger Woman, dancer and socialite Betty May claimed her “coster’s eye” meant she liked to wear as many colours as possible. “Colours to me are like children to a loving mother. Each is my favourite, yet I can never bring myself to deny the others by preferring one.” May’s bold and inclusive strategy is one that manages to transfer itself, almost a century later, to Hagen, the new record by Titanic.
Many will know Titanic as the Mexico City-based band of composer/producer/multi-instrumentalist Héctor Tosta (aka I. la Católica) and composer/cellist/singer Mabe Fratti. With Hagen–and their previous release, 2023’s critically acclaimed debut LP Vidrio–the pair are creating a distinctive signature sound in modern alternative pop music. Nobody else sounds quite like them. Both records have an open hearted nature and simple, winning melodies that play off against a taste for drama, spectacular orchestration and a feeling of otherworldly mystery. Hagen is the more ambitious, often more mystical effort. From the opening handclaps of “Lágrima del sol,” a wonderfully uptempo playground chant, the record dances its way through various mid-to-late-eighties inspirations, as well as lush and widescreen passages of melancholy and vertiginous contrasts.
Mystery is found in the simple but slightly odd song titles. English translations of various track titles give “You swallowed the gum,” “Leak,” “A tear from the sun,” “Raising the trophy,” “Digging dimensions,” “The owner,” “The decapitated hen,” and “The trap is exposed.” All denote striking images, metaphysical hints and emotional cues or simple, even childlike actions. The album’s title could even be a crafty play on words: the listener would be forgiven in thinking the moments of brash contrast and eyebrow raising theatricalism in the music nod to German punk icon Nina Hagen.
There is a feeling of self-reliance about Hagen that suits it. This often comes from the fact that singer and cellist Mabe Fratti has a rare and brilliant knack of speaking to us directly. There is never the suspicion of her playing to the gallery, the directness of many of the lyrics don’t allow it. “Gotera” uses harsh slashes of cello and tough, gunfire-like guitars and drums and multiple vocal lines that could be acting as a Greek chorus. They play off brilliantly against Fratti’s soft, slightly baleful vocal take that delivers lyrics such as: “nadie encuentra la gotera / y yo se donde está / se pelean en la puerta y / nadie logra entrar” (“nobody knows where the leak is / but I know where it is / they fight in front of the door and / nobody can go in”). With “Gallina degollada” the somewhat blithe melody melody line, sung with what could be sarcastic brio by Fratti, plays against an itching rhythm and rasping guitar part. The punch comes when you see that the song is about a chicken that has been decapitated and read lyrics such as: “I already saw it, it moved, the decapitated chicken’ / ‘could it be that I'm broken” and “Two people hurt each other by thinking that they no longer agree’/ ‘Hours pass and the chicken represents what scares me.”
Fratti has an almost magical ability to make Tosta’s melodies–and her and Tosta’s lyrics–into something imbued with true insight and meaning. The listener can pick up on the delight the record takes in skillfully weaving the meanings around its many narratives. And like May and her colourful outfits, Hagen’s sound revels in its own sense of richness. Throughout, the record delivers vaulting string sections or glutinous guitar squeals that could, like the powerful, driving “Escarbo dimensiones” have come directly from a glossy 1980s TV series. The thud and thump of “La trampa sale,” and its sudden change of tempo and mood betrays a monstrously ambitious piece of music, the players almost greedily creating the sounds. Other moments are heart wrenching: “Libra” ends on a poppy chord switch that cleverly ramps up the emotion inherent in the music’s notation. You could almost imagine a teenager in a bedroom forty years ago, rewinding the track over and over on a small, cheap cassette player, unable to get enough of that sugarsweet switch. Elsewhere, Daniel Lopatin (Oneohtrix Point Never) adds stardust and an unearthly sense of space on the changeable, slightly moody meditation, “Pájaro de fuego.” The record ends with “Alzando el trofeo,” a track that could soundtrack a state wedding, what with its beautiful cascading piano parts, a sugary vocal and short triumphal guitar riffs that add a rich patina to the overall sound.
Bedazzled by the playing, the skyscraping ambition in the arrangements and the giddy moments of contrast thrown up by Hagen, we could allow ourselves a brief moment of flippancy and state that Titanic’s new record is Yacht Rock meets Aeschylus, full-on. It’s also worth speculating that, in this hyper-sensitive, intemperate age, Titanic’s music has the power, however fleetingly, to heal hurts. Hagen is a brilliant showcase for a fresh and enriching form of pop music: displaying a magpie eye for what glints and plundering what has gone before.
Like Vidrio, Hagen was partially and additionally recorded at Fratti and Tosta’s house, aka Tinho Studios in Mexico City, as well as Golden Girl Studios and Circular Ruin Studios in New York City. Mixing was done by Santiago Parra in Pedro y el Lobo Studios, Mexico City and mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studios, New York City. The recording engineer was Nate Salon.
Hagen was performed by I. la Católica (guitar, keyboards, prepared piano, bass, and backing vocals), Fratti (cello, vocals), Eli Keszler (drums), as well as Salon on drums, synths and programming, and synthesisers performed by Daniel Lopatin on “Pájaro de fuego.”
All compositions on Hagen are written by I. la Católica, except “Escarbo Dimensiones” and “Pájaro de fuego,” which were composed by I. la Católica and Mabe Fratti. The record was produced by I. la Católica–with co-production by Fratti and Salon. And all lyrics are by I. la Católica except “Escarbo dimensiones,” “Gotera,” “Gallina degollada,” “Pájaro de fuego,” which were written by I. la Católica and Mabe Fratti.
