Vagabon - "Sorry I Haven't Called"

Some decent, but hookless, Electropop

“Vagabon” is the stage name of Laetitia Tamko, a Cameroonian-American multi-instrumentalist. Tamko’s family moved from Cameroon to New York when she was 13 so that her mother could attend law school. A few years later, her parents bought her a guitar. Now, she has released three albums and has over 300k monthly listeners on Spotify.

Sorry I Haven’t Called is firmly an Electropop affair, but there are Indie and Rock infusions throughout the album. And, as good Electropop should be, the album is full of boppy, catchy tunes. Even the slower tracks have decent beats and hooks.

It is thoroughly enjoyable throughout. There are some odd production decisions in play, such as the vocal warping in track 5, “Passing Me By”, because Tamko’s voice sounds like an entirely different person (but the credits don’t mention anybody else).

The album is a little on the short side for an LP, at only 34 minutes. There is a single interlude track (titled “Interlude”) which runs for less than a minute, but the other eleven tracks generally track a little shorter than the average radio-ready pop song, with every song packed into a tight playtime range of just over a minute (2:22 for the shortest song, and 3:28 for the longest). So no song really overstays its welcome. But, also, none of them really leave me wanting, either.

Anybody who regularly reads my reviews should know, by now, that I generally despise short-form tracks. And while I do think that the music found on Sorry I Haven’t Called is good, it’s pretty telling that I’m also fine with how short the songs are. 

While I ended up having a lot to say about how little there was to say with my last review (see yesterday’s TesseracT album review), I just plumb don’t have anything else to say about this one.

Give it a listen if you’re looking for some Electropop or a couple of bops.

Rating: Yellow