Live Review: G Elenil makes one last statement for 2018 with her 'Cool It' visuals

Brisbane’s G ELENIL started this year with a bang, dropping her debut EP Kin, a diaristic, genre-defiant exploration of familial trauma, back in May which capped her ascension through the Brisbane hip hop scene. And now, she’s looking to close 2k18 out with one last statement piece, unveiling the visuals for ‘Cool It’, the final single to be lifted from her debut EP.

Depicting a fever-style dream within the mind of a dying (fictional) G Elenil, the QUE FILM COLLECTIVE-directed visuals build on the narrative woven throughout videos for previous singles, ‘Something’, ‘Good Time’ and ‘Long Drive’. So the visuals for ‘Cool It’, much like the track itself, benefit from experiencing it within the full context of the rest of G’s output from this year. Much like her EP, this fever dream is a typically category-less affair, taking inspiration from the Lynchian world of Twin Peaks to the twisted aesthetics of DIE ANTEWOORD and through to the stylishness of GRACE JONES and BEYONCÉ (peep that choreography).

Of the track, G says that “[‘Cool It’ is] about wanting something and being on the limit of your abilities. The sort of people that find themselves there are my favourite people. I want them to feel this track like that”. By the time it arrives as the EP’s closing track, ‘Cool It’ functions as a celebration of a flawed, deeply complicated human being, someone who’s burying their struggle beneath a veneer of self-reliance and braggadocio. Throughout Kin, G Elenil opens up just enough, offering us a glimpse into  to show that she’s someone who’s survived - but who is not defined by their past. ‘Cool It’ celebrates this fact.

It does so with an omnivorous appetite, blending together bubblegum pop and modern, energetic trap production courtesy of frequent collaborator TOMTOM. Chirpy synth chords ping-pong around the mix like serotonin firing off in your brain, going into overdrive. Meanwhile, G’s vocals brim with unabashed, unholdable charisma as she modulates between sweetly dripping R&B melodies in the chorus to an unbothered flow that’s bordering on speaking at times, boasting of G’s own survival skills.

It's a pretty good statement to round out the year on, but if G Elenil's 2018 proves anything, it's not that she's simply surviving but that she's thriving. 

Image: SUPPLIED

Words by KYLE FENSOM

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