#37

#37. SAFIA - Paranoia, Ghosts & Other Sounds (#96, 2014)

4th of 2014

Listen

There's a peculiar individual that exists in the depths of Wikipedia. A mysterious user with no clear background or motivation but a simple goal to perpetually edit a couple of Hottest 100 articles with a false version of events. They are nothing if not consistent and persistent, coming back roughly once a month to reinstate their ideal order, which consists of various songs shifted around, often swapped for some songs that didn't quite make the list. They've been doing this for about 7 years now, and the only word of motivation I've ever seen from them is when one of the articles was semi-protected and they (someone who doesn't actually have an account) urged for editors to do their work for them. It is something to look out for, of course. Very often I've seen Wikipedia articles that just have flagrantly made up information on them that's survived for years. My only fear is that this person who often makes edits on new IP addresses has perhaps done something somewhere that went unnoticed. I say this because I spotted it once on the article for this very song, where they'd changed the song's blurb to match their incorrect report of its placing. Maybe that's harmless to some, but I feel like in the age of generative AI, it's gotten easier than ever for incorrect information to propagate, and we can't just sit back and watch lies become the truth. Vigilance is so important.

"Paranoia, Ghosts & Other Sounds" is just SAFIA's second single. At this point in time there's so little to go by with the group, with barely anything written and nothing but the small tropes we've picked up between the two songs to make sense of how the band tick. A year later, when "Counting Sheep" (#69) was released, the band considered it the evil sibling to this song. There's probably something in that. The two songs don't sound particularly similar, but both carry similar themes of paranoia (go figure). "Counting Sheep" prioritises sounding as menacing as possible, while there's a hint of hope to this one, like a story that goes through its conflict until eventually reaching a happy ending.

That darkness is the thing I remember the most about this song. If it established anything in the moment, it's that SAFIA had a penchant for making major pivots in their songs. "Listen To Soul, Listen To Blues" (#220) started it, this song continued it, but then they didn't really keep it up after that. They made more of a pivot to typical song structures, and so the big switch ups were more reserved for verse-chorus transitions. "You Are The One" and "Embracing Me" (#788) turn it into something more like a fake out intro, as they end up in very different places from where they start. When this song came out though, all there was to conclude is that SAFIA were going to shift the mood of all of their songs at around the two minute mark.

In fairness, it's not exactly a bad move either. It'd be wrong for me to discredit it when I've spent the last 2 years doing the exact same thing with this blog, but just generally as a trope, it hits more effectively to jump into the deep end after establishing the prior calm. It can be the juxtaposition that becomes more important than what's actually going on, making you pay more attention to the additions & differences. For instance here, the main driving factor is some muffled vocals that appear at the very start of the song. Once the song shifts gear, you can start to make out actual words from it, like it's finally able to break free of the spell. Ben's main vocals even follow the same cadence as if to say it's all one in the same. This is the part where I reference the recent hit film "Obsession" and make everyone who's seen it nod their head and go 'ah yes, I too have seen that particular film and understand this laboured comparison'.

Beyond that though, the song descends into pure chaos and I love it for it. The drums start to really pound their way into focus, and the vibrating, howling background vocals express the mood better than anything else. It's a lengthy period where you're largely short of words to sing along with, and yet it's evocative all the same. It would feel harsh to SAFIA to say they never made a song better than this but it really felt like the sky was the limit when this was only the second song they put out. Polling here just showing that they didn't have to play by the rules, they were too busy establishing their own order of business.