Camille Schmidt – ‘Nude #9’ album review: Laugh or you’ll cry greatness
“When I’m alone, I go fucking crazy, conjuring a demon in my room,” Camille Schmidt sings on ‘XOXO’, the opening track to her debut album, Nude #9, and for the rest of the ten tracks, it’s as if the New York artist sits with the demon, simply chatting.
The Skinny: To the surprise of literally no one, the New York music scene is thriving. Has there ever really been a point when it wasn’t, given that, since the dawn of time, it feels as if anyone with a creative bone in their body feels a kind of subconscious draw to the city that never sleeps, even if that only ever comes in the form of a holiday?
Currently, Brooklyn is the epicentre of it all, and among other names to note, like Eliza Edens and Allegra Krieger, Camille Schmidt is someone the world beyond the borough should be paying attention to.
Already, her earlier releases brought in a cultish following, enamoured by the relatably varied emotions across her singles and the off-the-cuff way she presents them, with humour on ‘Fake Out Ending’ or a desire for peace on ‘Bumblebee Drinks Lavender’.
But with her early doors debut, wasting no time delivering something incredible at the start of the year, Nude #9 is a masterclass in the magic she’s already presented and then some.
The demon in her room takes many forms. It feels that way because from start to finish here, Schmidt isn’t just confessional but feels hyper-confessional, purging even as the entire record is charged by personal scenes and images, from the little, silly moments of crashing out in town with a hot matcha, to dark, devastating experiences. For those, and for the clearest example of Schmidt’s ability to turn the personal into the universal, look towards ‘Heaven’; a poignant travelogue of losses, weird comments and haunting memories, hinged on the chorus, “Heaven’s always closer than it seems, And lately it seems really close to me.”
Musically, the record is hypnotically dynamic too. In one moment, Schmidt will go all in on Imogen Heap-esque production and vocal distortion, then on the next, she’s classically balladic, folkish a moment later. But the power of Nude #9 undeniably lies in her willingness to share and confront, and how she navigates that like a friend talking to a friend, a person writing in their diary, or someone conjuring a demon and both reflecting on it, and using it as a therapist.
The Verdict: Moving between humour and sharp heart, this is a ‘you’ve gotta laugh, or you’ll cry’ type record that still lets you cry and never tells you off for making a joke of the worst of it.
Standout track: ‘Heaven’
Release Date: January 10th, 2025 | Producer: Ben Zaidi | Label: Six Castle Road
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