Immunity

With the DIY video for her 2017 track “Pretty Girl”, Clairo became the premier case study for how the internet can instantly blow up homespun artists. But with her full-length debut album, the Massachusetts indie-pop phenom betrays a bold artistic vision that can no longer be contained by her bedroom walls. Co-produced by the artist with ex-Vampire Weekender Rostam Batmanglij, <i>Immunity</i> achieves just the right balance of focus and fuzz, expanding Clairo’s sonic vocabulary with neo-soul vibes, jazzy piano lines and boom-bapped drum breaks while framing her most brutally honest tracks—like the break-up lament “Bags” and same-sex-love anthem “Sofia”—with gritty intensity and blown-out distortion. Throughout the album, Clairo tries to reconcile her desire for independence with her need for intimacy, an emotional tug-of-war that reaches its zenith on the momentous closer “I Wouldn’t Ask You”, a stark, defiant piano ballad that cedes to the warm embrace of its ecstatic chillwave outro.