Coupdekat’s “violet” is the soundtrack for the moody afterparty

It bears little likeness to her previous single, the glittery, drilling electro-pop “i still think about the band”, which situates you in the thick of the party’s chaotic dance-floor. The ’90s oneiric trip-hop-indebted “violet” is rather the sudden mood shift from lingering around a little too long – the dance-floor is emptying, the anxiety is starting to creep up, and tomorrow’s hangover is imminent. It’s a bizarre phenomenon from hedonistic partying, but that dramatic switch-up comes from having such fun. Even though the genre-bending pop star Coupdekat is more inclined to energetic music, “violet” still carries a similar sensibility: “It’s actually not that slow of a track. It just hasn’t got those party elements anymore, or they’ve been dulled down – everything’s under an underwater filter,” she explains.

To understand how Coupdekat began earnestly dissecting the function, one must dive into her eye-catching musical resume that screams stardom. As a 12-year-old, she began writing songs on guitar, listening to female singer/songwriters and Irish folk artists like Mary Black. “That really inspired me,” she says. “I try to keep songwriting and storytelling at the forefront of everything I do because that’s what speaks to me when it comes to music.” Her mum introduced her to fundamental punk artists such as Blondie, The Buzzcocks, and Sex Pistols, crediting her punk cadence to that education, and she gigged with her friend’s punky shoegaze band from around 14 to 18.

Then, COVID hit. “We tried making stuff on Zoom, and it was terrible,” Coupdekat recalls. “It was such a weird time for music, and honestly, I felt there was a sound that I wanted to create that couldn’t be created in the band setting.” The pandemic didn’t stunt her – inspired by Clairo’s blueprint bedroom pop and the necessity of recording alone, she took matters into her own hands by carving out a sound that felt true to her. Over the COVID summer, she was in Paris writing songs fit for the Clairo or Gus Dapperton alt-pop world, but once restrictions lifted upon her return to the UK, dance music made to be played loud at night was all on Coupdekat’s mind. “I was going out a lot and living the life I hadn’t lived when I was 18,” she says. “I was creating a soundtrack to that life. That has always been an importance of mine, and life changed in a way that I wanted to explore the soundtrack to that nighttime escape landscape.”

When you chronologically enter Coupdekat's world, it becomes clear: the newer the songs, the sweeter the sonic sugar rush. This new era, visually and aesthetically, is also born of the optimistic early 2010s internet, specifically its non-judgemental self-expression, which surveillant, profit-hungry corporations have since largely eroded. In other words, it evokes the time when the world and the internet weren’t so shit. Coupdekat is one of those people who grew up during that period and is now ready to dance away the pain. With the electro-clash and indie sleaze revivals well underway, the timing couldn’t be better.

Coupdekat wrote her new material with New York producer connerdeck in his tiny Bushwick apartment, who shared similar tastes. Frost Children’s SISTER, one of the most uncynical approaches to festival EDM, had just released when she landed in the city: “They were a big influence. We started so many tracks, but we were like, ‘We have to get it close to how good their songs are.’” Further influences she cites are Babymorocco and Kim Petras, Madonna’s Ray of Light, and New York’s unending nightlife, like watching underground pop royalty Oklou, umru, Doss, and underscores perform in a single night. “It was crazy! Shit like that would happen every night,” Coupdekat says, still in awe.

Clearly, bustling New York was pivotal, and again, so was the early internet. The carefree innocence of that nicer iteration is what Coupdekat hopes to capture on her upcoming debut album, Goodbye 2012, named after the iconic scene YouTube video, Goodbye 2010. The single artworks are selfies from her old Facebook profile, taken with a friend at Claire’s, complete with neon nerd glasses. “There was no thought involved in that at all; it was purely like, ‘I’m taking photos of my friends, and I’m going to post pictures of it,’ and that’s it. There’s no other layers to it.” Coupdekat explains social media’s former lack of curation. “Whereas over time, especially with Instagram, there’s layers of self-awareness: ‘If I post this, how is it perceived?’ ‘How am I perceived as a person?’ ‘How do I perceive myself?’”

As Coupdekat inspiringly rewires her brain to go against the perturbing conventions of modern social media, Goodbye 2012 is also an incredible tribute to the pure, unadulterated internet that showed utopian promise – having fun and being your own without invasive algorithms. “2012 felt like the year before I started being so self-aware,” she admits. “Looking at my Facebook posts from that time, I felt this love for the little me. I was trying to understand where she went. ‘Is she still there?’ ‘Should I try to get back to that person, or are we so far away from that world that she will never return?’ It really sparked something in me to write an album about it.”