Jillian Lake - “Tactile”
Jillian Lake from Vancouver, Canada, explores vulnerability and grief with the blistering track, “Tactile.”
“Tactile” is a grooving indie rock number that wouldn’t feel out of place played on an evening drive on a highway at full throttle, or even on MTV during its golden era of the 1990s. The composition pulses with a confident relentless momentum thanks to the hypnotic insistent of the drums and bass. Tight but not over polished, this is indie rock that has somewhere to be.
Texturally, it’s the rich electric guitars that steal the show delivering a satisfying, choppy mid-range. With a hint of crunch, it only adds to the rhythmic insistence that this song needs to be played loud. Jillian Lake gives us a pleasing hiatus from the high-octane bombast in the second half when we are fleetingly immersed in an airy, trance-like ambience. Dreamy and evocative, but more in the vein of Tei Shi’s Verde, rather than Brian Eno.
Jillian Lake serves up a beautifully alluring, intimate vocal across this banger. Cool, floating above the churn of the guitars, the performance begins wistfully detached before evolving into something that is more defiant, insistent and passionate.
On the meaning behind “Tactile” Jillian Lake adds: “It seems fitting that the last song I released was called “Playing Dead” and then I just kinda laid dormant for a while before I was ready to share more. “Tactile” is about how grief is this invisible and intangible thing that is so hard to navigate. A scraped knee, a black eye, a broken arm - is so much easier to make sense of than something you can’t pinpoint. Something you can’t bandage or brace.”