You know the modern crisis that is only really a modern crisis is one that begins when someone who you were so easily labeled as ‘just a friend’ sends a totally mundane text that somehow your brain insists is a world-altering event? And then you hear a song capturing that? It’s not a love song, it’s not a breakup song, it’s just the sheer embarrassment and slight terror of finding yourself falling for the last person you were ever meant to.
That confusion and riskiness are at the core of “Kinda Love It,” the latest track from Romanian indie-pop artist Francis On My Mind. It’s not quite love and it’s not quite a break-up song. Instead, it is that slightly embarrassing/frustrating moment of realizing you’ve caught feelings for someone who should have been off-limits all along.
Perhaps what is most incredible about this song is how it is totally comfortable living with contradiction. The topic is undoubtedly full of fear, ambiguity, and the risk of emotional fallout but it’s the production that sits entirely in control, filled with warm synth sounds and a natural confidence that walks a great line between radio-friendly gloss and intimate bedroom pop production. It’s a song that is vulnerable without being sappy and has a killer infectiousness while remaining fully Francis.
These are the qualities that Francis On My Mind has built a reputation on: Her songs always feel less like a public declaration and more like private thought that has accidentally leaked into a recording booth, specific enough in emotion to feel intensely personal and open enough that every single person listening can readily apply the blank spaces to their own life story. “Kinda Love It” continues this pattern.
The song itself perfectly captures this unique stage of attraction, where panic is blooming hand-in-hand with nascent feelings and you’re both simultaneously realizing that something is changing and that you absolutely cannot push it back in its box. It’s awkward and slightly irrational, making it instantly relatable.
It’s the fact that Francis doesn’t attempt to gloss over the mess or make the situation feel anything but chaotic that is so amazing; she fully inhabits the exact feeling of confused panic and lets you embrace it with her, an act of radical vulnerability.
Francis On My Mind has mastered the art that many solo indie artists spent years trying to obtain: Writing music about the intensely personal experience in a way that is relatable to all. “Kinda Love It” could be about a single set of circumstances but, as all brilliant indie pop tunes can be, it should find a way to make each and every listener believe it’s about theirs.
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About the Author
A tenured media critic known working as a ghost writer, freelance critic for publications in the US and former lead writer of Atop The Treehouse. Reviews music, film and TV shows for media aggregators.
