Artists You Should Know: Gigi Perez Prepares For Calamity And Its Aftermath On Debut EP "How To Catch A Falling Knife"

With the release of her debut EP How To Catch A Falling Knife, singer/songwriter Gigi Perez makes a stunning introduction forged out of loss and heartache. The Brooklyn-based artist has been releasing singles since last year, each one exploring with raw lucidity a different difficult period of her life. From the moment the EP begins you’re submerged in her anguished but soul-propelling anthems. Drawn in by both her tender lyricism and the piercing lull of her cries.

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“Kill For You” opens the EP with this resounding bleeding-heart expression of devotion, one hitched to a soaring medley of grumbling guitars and thunderous drums. Wrapped up in torrid intimacy and desperate desire, Perez is a fiery vision of unabashed emotion. The single also comes with a music video directed by Leaf Lieber that visualizes all that virulent passion and her attempts to rally against grief. Complete with a brutal ending that cuts exceptionally deep, drawn as it is from the immense personal tragedy suffered by Perez.

The way she wavers between riding waves of surging alt-rock pummelings and then coasts dreamily through her more languid ballads calls to mind other incisively personal singer/songwriters like Lucy Dacus.

On “Figurines” she weaves her mesmeric and poetic lyricism through a gloaming soundscape of twanging guitars (and one particularly riveting solo instrumental), sending her wails echoing through the haunting gloom. While the airy lilts of “Glue” loose themselves at first in heartbreak it’s not long before Perez is sailing on the etherealness of her own cries. She finishes the album with a one-two gut punch that comes in the form of another shuddering anthem “Karma” and the lovelorn ballad “Sally.”

“‘How To Catch A Falling Knife’ is not a guide but a question,” Perez shares. “How do you? Here you will find eight songs that resemble eight chapters of my life. Following the loss of my oldest sister and the ending of my first love, I grasp to understand yearning, anguish, ruminating, sleeplessness, malaise, yearning, rinse repeat. Where did I go Wrong? And How Can I Never Make That Mistake Again?”