THE BIG BROTHER STEPS OUT OF BILLIE’S SHADOW
THESE are exhilarating times for the O’Connell siblings of Los Angeles. With a debut album that has struck a chord with a legion of female fans, Billie Eilish Pirate Baird O’Connell is the biggest new star of 2019.
Billie’s older brother is part of the picture, too. Finneas O’Connell co-writes and produces his 17-year-old sister’s music, and accompanies her on tour playing guitar and keyboards. It was a song he wrote and gave to Billie, Ocean Eyes, that kick-started her career when they recorded it in their childhood home in Highland Park and shared it online. Finneas, 22, is striking out in his own right, too. The musician and actor, who played Alistair in the TV musical series Glee and has been co-writing with Latin star Camila Cabello, is releasing a seven-track mini-album of songs documenting the ups and downs of the past 18 months.
Blood Harmony was made while Finneas was touring with his sister this summer. It was put together in hotel rooms and on tour buses.
It’s an assured solo bow. Billie doesn’t sing here, but Blood Harmony complements her own material well. The lean electronics and resilient hooks of her chart
topping debut When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? were put in place by her brother rather than a middle-aged Svengali, and Finneas’s sure-footed touch is evident again.
His songs fall roughly into two camps — McCartneyesque piano ballads and upbeat, digital pop. Of the former, Partners In Crime is a tender piece about camaraderie and I Lost A Friend addresses the impact of sudden fame.
‘He don’t need me because he made a little too much money to be 20 and sad,’ sings Finneas against a backdrop of gospel handclaps and auto-tune. Is he talking of a former companion or parroting the reaction of others to his success? It’s ambiguous, but still mightily effective.
The faster songs are clever and quirky. Shelter is punctuated by flamenco guitar rasgueados and, reiterating that Blood Harmony was made in Europe, I Don’t Miss You At All namechecks F. Scott Fitzgerald while conjuring up images of an American in Paris.
With his sister on the path to superstardom, Finneas may ultimately find his niche as a supportive backroom boy. But Blood Harmony — its title a reference to the pair’s ‘biological chemistry’ — confirms there are additional strings to his bow.
MIKA topped the charts with his debut album but has largely disappeared from view here since his fourth album No Place In Heaven in 2015. The singersongwriter, has actually been hard at work, maintaining his profile as a judge on The X Factor in Italy and The Voice in France while continuing to tour.
He’s now back with an album that revisits the theatrics of 2007’s Life In Cartoon Motion. Working with Bastille producer Mark Crew and co-writers including former Fame Academy winner David Sneddon and Ed Sheeran associate Amy Wadge, his big-hearted songs are distinctive but can sometimes be overcooked.
Tiny Love, built around a pounding piano, Bohemian Rhapsody guitars and lush harmonies, typifies his baroque extravagance while Stay High is a lively soul pastiche and Sanremo a sunny pop number.