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**Nilüfer Yanya – Painless**
★★★★☆

Three years after her stunning debut "Miss Universe" announced the arrival of a singular voice in British indie rock, Nilüfer Yanya returns with "Painless," an album that finds the London-born artist wrestling with the weight of expectation while carving out an even more distinctive sonic territory. Where her first full-length occasionally felt like a collection of brilliant fragments searching for cohesion, "Painless" presents a more focused vision, one that consolidates her strengths while pushing into new emotional and musical terrain.

The intervening years between albums weren't idle ones for Yanya. The pandemic lockdowns forced a period of introspection that seeped into her songwriting, while the critical acclaim for "Miss Universe" brought both opportunities and pressure. Add to this the universal experience of navigating your twenties – relationships forming and dissolving, career anxieties, the search for identity – and you have the raw material for an album that feels both deeply personal and universally relatable.

Musically, "Painless" sees Yanya expanding her palette while retaining the core elements that made her debut so compelling. Her guitar work remains the album's backbone, alternating between crystalline arpeggios and fuzzed-out distortion with an intuitive sense of dynamics. But there's a newfound confidence in her arrangements, a willingness to let songs breathe and develop organically. The production, handled by Yanya herself alongside Wilma Archer, strikes an ideal balance between intimacy and spaciousness, allowing her distinctive voice – that remarkable instrument capable of conveying vulnerability and strength in the same phrase – to sit perfectly in the mix.

The album's opening salvo, "the dealer," immediately establishes the record's themes of dependency and self-doubt over a hypnotic guitar loop that recalls the best of 90s alternative rock without feeling derivative. It's followed by "L/R," a track that showcases Yanya's ability to craft pop hooks without sacrificing her artistic integrity. The song's exploration of indecision and paralysis – "I don't know my left from right" – becomes an anthem for anyone who's ever felt overwhelmed by choice.

"shameless" stands as perhaps the album's finest moment, a slow-burning meditation on guilt and self-perception that builds to a cathartic crescendo. Yanya's vocals here are particularly striking, moving from whispered confessions to soaring declarations with seamless grace. The track exemplifies her gift for taking internal struggles and transforming them into something transcendent.

Elsewhere, "stabilise" demonstrates her growing confidence with rhythm and groove, while "midnight sun" finds her at her most experimental, incorporating electronic elements that complement rather than compete with her guitar-based foundation. "belong with you" offers one of the album's most direct emotional statements, a love song that manages to be both tender and unsettling, much like the best relationships themselves.

The album's title track serves as its emotional centrepiece, a sprawling seven-minute journey that moves through multiple sections and moods. It's here that Yanya's growth as a songwriter is most evident – her ability to sustain interest over an extended form while maintaining the song's essential character shows an artist coming into full command of her powers.

If "Painless" has a weakness, it's perhaps in its occasional tendency toward introspection at the expense of immediacy. Some tracks, while beautifully crafted, can feel a bit too interior, lacking the visceral punch of her best work. But this is a minor complaint about an album that succeeds brilliantly at its primary goal: establishing Nilüfer Yanya as one of the most important voices in contemporary British music.

Two years on from its release, "Painless" has proven to be a grower rather than an immediate stunner, the kind of album that reveals new layers with each listen. It's secured Yanya's position in the pantheon of essential British indie artists, sitting comfortably alongside the work of PJ Harvey, Radiohead, and other acts who've managed to balance artistic integrity with genuine emotional connection.

In an era when so much music feels disposable, "Painless" stands as a testament to the enduring power of thoughtful songcraft and genuine artistic vision. It's an album that demands attention and rewards patience, marking Nilüfer Yanya as an artist with staying power.