Blood Culture’s New Single “No Favors” is a Left Field Pop Song That Encourages Embracing Uncertainty in a World of Flux

BloodCultures1_sm — Blood Cultures, photo courtesy the artists

The beginning of “No Favors” by Blood Cultures sounds like someone is sampling the instrumentation from a heat warped record and the vocals like they’re coming from an AM radio broadcast. But then the electronic bass comes in and the bright, melodic synths to make a flow of upbeat yet, organic pop but with interruptions in the flow like a set of frames clipped from a film. As the track unfolds it passes in and out of styles of music while maintaining a dream pop/chillwave-esque sound. The song disorients expectations in order the cleanse your brain of predispositions and then aims to fill in that blank with comfort in ambiguity as the vocalist admits to not knowing what to say or do in a life and world of flux but leaving implied that we have the ability to work through the moment without having to have a firm operating framework and that often we must act or at least feel the moment without the convenient certainty most people naturally crave—a world that makes sense. This song plays on those tensions of knowing and being okay with not knowing and to be off the map a little. In the end the song, as a coherent pop song, suggests we’ll be okay even if we never really get our footing if we trust in our ability to handle what comes our way. Listen to “No Favors” on Soundcloud and follow this anonymous, enigmatic band called Blood Cultures at the links provided. Look for the group’s new album Oh Uncertainty! A Universe Despairs out on September 13.