One Second of Love, the second album by L.A.'s Ramona Gomez, A.K.A. Nite Jewel, has been one of my most listened to albums of the year. There was a period of about two or three months when I first got One Second of Love that I listened to it up to six times a day. The album really turned me around on some of the more recent synth-pop including Toronto's Memoryhouse and Brooklyn's Chairlift, both who put out full-lengths as well at the beginning of this year. However, only Nite Jewel has made it onto my "prestigious" end-of-year favourites list.
Hints of sorrow underlie many of the songs on One Second of Love, but grandiosely sustained synth and drums that seem to echo into space on the swooping opener "This Story" belie the melancholy the music and lyrics otherwise forebode.
The following title-track immediately takes One Second of Love to a starker place. More importantly for me, though, the track may have provided the catalyst for one of my most significant musical revelations: one of my favourite elements in music is tension. I like when elements that shouldn't go together are forced into the same auditory space and, for whatever cosmic reason, totally work. "One Second of Love"'s spire-shaped synths joust with deep bass notes and metallic, clanging, church-bell percussion for control, like Nite Jewel refuses to let negativity prevail. As a result, the song sounds choppy, at once stuttering but then flowing, some parts chunky and other parts fluid. This structure is perhaps most pronounced on the more cheerful "She's Always Watching You."
Despite such seemingly incongruous moments, One Second of Love is graceful as well in its minimalism and deliberation. Nite Jewel's magic is all in how and where she chooses to place every detail, never dabbing more than she needs. Just listen to the barely existent acoustic guitar, drooping, cuppy suction sounds and glimmering electronics on the glacial "Unearthly Delights." These sounds (with the exception of the acoustic guitar) are often only heard on purely ambient albums by artists such as Autechre, whom she cites as a primary influence, but none of the elements or motifs in Nite Jewel's arrangements become effaced by repetition as in so much pure ambience.
"Unearthly Delights" comes halfway through One Second of Love, thus marking the rather late beginning of listeners' realization that for such a relatively minimal album, One Second of Love is quite diverse. "No I Don't," which follows "Delights," slowly scours the cavern floor, hitting the album's lowest notes - notes so low, they're mostly distorted rumbles and warped, inharmonious electronic clicks and zaps. "Autograph," also coming so late in the album, kicks it into an unexpected downbeat, flirtatious groove. Think the New Deal's "Don't Blame Yourself" featuring Feist with its deep, bobbing bass-line. The blissfully celestial "Clive" immediately contrasts the cozy, intimate "Autograph," filling my head with nothing but clouds when I close my eyes. And just when I think One Second of Love couldn't get anymore heavenly, "Sister" sends the album through the earth's exosphere, closing the album on the highest possible high.
One Second of Love is spacious yet catchy, slightly melancholy yet slightly danceable (at least groovy). Nite Jewel successfully combines usually disagreeable elements to give what are pop songs at their cores the illusion of unpredictable structures by way of deliberate but unexpected arrangements. Perhaps the song that best demonstrates all of this, and for that reason is my favourite song on One Second of Love, is "Memory Man." If you're not hooked, don't give up. As I've said, One Second of Love is surprisingly diverse. Give it all a chance, and you too may never come back down.
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