underscores - U

underscores makes pop songs that play out like spats between close friends. Not tidy little disputes, either. Proper full-on rows where every idea gets interrupted by a better one halfway through. On 'U', April Harper Grey [For it is she, etc, etc - Ed] takes that impulse and sharpens it into something close to deadly.

If 'Wallsocket' felt like being dropped into a world with its own internal climate, 'U' feels like standing right in front of the gigantic air-con system blasting it out. It is tighter, less interested in proving how many things she can do at once. Nine tracks, just over half an hour, and no dead air. Nothing here hangs about because it likes the sound of itself.

'Tell Me (U Want It)' knows how hard and how fast to push at the limits, while 'Music' inspires both wild joy and a hurts-in-a-good-way wince. They're immediate on first play and intoxicatingly weird on a second. By the third, they're certified genius.

Grey has always had a gift for making synthetic things feel grubby and human, yet also brilliantly slick and future-focused at the same time. Here, she adds another one. She can make polished pop feel risky. It's there in how quickly the songs turn corners, or how often a line that sounds throwaway on first pass becomes the emotional centre ten minutes later.

A lot of artists who find themselves shoved closer to the mainstream on a wave of underground love can lose what made them interesting at the edges. 'U' does the opposite. It is more direct than earlier records, but never, ever blander. More melodic, but in no way safe. There are choruses here that bigger names would take in a heartbeat, yet the album never feels like it could be sold off in parts. It still sounds like one person with very particular instincts and very little patience for cliché.

There is humour in it as well, and not the kind that needs to overplay the irony. Grey understands the rank absurdity of pop life without pretending she stands outside it. Fame, fantasy, performance, embarrassment, lust, self-loathing, confidence, panic. They all perk their heads up across the album, often in the same song. That emotional volatility is the point.

The writing has improved, too. Not because it has become solemn or overtly literary in a self-important 'aren't I clever?' way. Grey lands images quickly. She knows when to leave a thought unresolved and when to trust the listener to keep up. There is less structural scaffolding than before, and the songs are stronger for it.

Sure, a couple of moments pass so fast that it would be nice for her to stay put long enough for one extra verse. But that complaint only exists because everything else is moving at such a high level. The album is built on momentum, and it understands the cost of breaking it. We might instinctively be left wanting more, but sometimes more would be less.

What makes 'U' special is not that it is chaotic. Plenty of records are chaotic. What makes it sing is that it knows exactly where and how the chaos should land. Grey is no longer just brilliant at invention, but also at selection. The curation of not just styles and emotions, but also when to pull the rug or take a hard left, is not the kind of thing that can be taught. Some people just have pop running in their veins.

There are records to admire, and records to live inside for a while. 'U' is both, but - despite the immediacy - definitely the second kind. Vivid, funny, bruised, horny, annoyed, euphoric, lonely and weirdly tender, it has worked out that control and freedom are not polar opposites: they're a tug-of-war underscores is winning. This is a proper pop album, not in spite of its oddness, but because of it.