Travel has long ceased to mean buying tickets and packing suitcases. Tourism has transformed into an industry of consuming other people’s impressions – we scroll through Instagram, watch vlogs, read blogs, believing that seeing a picture is enough to understand a place. Music remains one of the few ways to experience travel from within, to feel its temperature, to hear its rhythm. Lauren Mian understands this.

The rising star’s new EP Off Script will take you on a journey in half an hour, filling your soul with vivid photo-memories. Her debut works like a traveler’s private diary, written for themselves, and you’ve accidentally glimpsed the pages. No need to look at pictures or scroll through posts to journey with Lauren Mian into a world of lights, mountains, sun, but I won’t reveal all the cards at once – I’ll simply tell you about this beautiful star.

Mian hails from New York, and her musical biography began with performances at venues like The Bitter End and Mercury Lounge – places where hundreds of singer-guitarists performed before her, where acoustics erase the difference between stage and audience. At Summer Sounds 2024 in New Rochelle, she played in the Chill Tent, presenting her granola girl folk to the public – a term that, though it sounds cute, conceals serious work with the genre. By November, it was time to release Off Script, and the EP lived up to its title. Everything here is quite simple. No promises that you’ll hear what you expected.

Off Script, in my perception, is structured like a conversation with friends to whom you’re telling a story, skipping details because they’ll understand anyway. Five tracks immerse you in memories of places that can only exist in memory – their geography is conditional, their meaning absolute. The EP sounds like an ode to sensuality, where dream and action merge in one movement. If a star has ignited, it’s time to pack your things and hit the road. Mian proposes going with her. Simply on the road.

Memory Lane. Immediately sets the tonality for all the material. Guitar overflows create a background over which Lauren Mian’s vocal soars – warm, soulful, penetrating. From the first seconds, it captures attention with an ease of sound that proves deceptive. The voice behaves unpredictably: now it pierces the sonic space with an insistent beam, now it dissolves into the instrumental fabric, yielding to guitar brilliance, now it melts away, loses form. Nostalgia here works as the track’s main engine.

Undertow. The second track changes the dynamic. Here there’s less contemplation, more movement forward. Lauren Mian persistently leads the melody toward resolution, anticipating the achievement of a goal. Lyricism yields to drive. Instead of gazing at stars – a ride at full speed, where lights, skyscrapers, sunset sky flash in the window.

The Drain. The third track returns to guitar overflows, but this time they lead to a different place. Instead of nostalgia – a waterfall. The slow dance of water, splashes, movement toward a dynamic chorus where boredom is excluded. Lauren Mian’s vocal acquires new shades: excitement, joy, love with barely perceptible tension are heard. A pause or finale? The track leaves the question open. The low register of the voice here fully reveals itself, fills with strength, which then yields to a long, drawn-out finale. Instruments whisper, voice melts.

Take Your Word. The fourth track is the EP’s culmination. Velvety waves of vocal spread across the sonic space, tired whisper invites to dialogue that explodes almost into a cry on the chorus. Lauren Mian’s low register is shown here in all its glory. The track creates an atmosphere of a cozy café with mountain views, where there’s room for wind, love, adventures, temptations. Mian gathers all her efforts to reach another person, to break the ice of someone else’s heart. The walk through the range from lows to highs happens against a sunset that paints everything with golden light.

Have My Fun. The final track returns to ballad form. Guitar, the soloist’s voice, the atmosphere of a summer garden in thick twilight. Have My Fun concludes the record worthily. What remains is friendly conversation over tea in the garden, songs with guitar. Warm, heartfelt, tender. The track works like a period that closes the story. The circle closes: the EP began with nostalgia, ends with tranquility. The finale is a conversation among close people, where you can tell the most intimate things. Simply music and the right moment.

I’m left with a pleasant aftertaste after Off Script by Lauren Mian. A real journey into a dream world, born at friendly gatherings over bubble tea, ending with them again, but now with completely different emotions. Off Script leaves a pleasant aftertaste.

The EP’s distinctive feature is the singer’s ability to show the heroine’s transformation. From the contemplation of Memory Lane to the decisiveness of Undertow, from the refreshing respite of The Drain to the emotional breakthrough of Take Your Word. Here Lauren Mian reveals the lioness in herself, employs all techniques to achieve reciprocated love, opposing bad luck, thunderstorms, wind, frosts. Did she succeed? The final track hints that the singer either got what she wanted and is now sharing impressions with friends, or accepted the result and moved on. Ambiguity is Off Script’s strong side.

For all its strengths, Off Script at times reveals its vulnerability. At times the record seems too private, intimate, designed for a narrow circle of listeners. This is simultaneously a strength and a limitation: intimacy attracts some, repels others. Some tracks may seem too similar to each other – guitar overflows, low vocals, nostalgic atmosphere repeat from song to song. There’s enough variety to keep the EP’s attention, but sometimes you want each track to sound more individual, to be remembered as a separate event.

At the same time, Off Script is a strong bid for a place in the contemporary alt folk scene. Lauren Mian has bottomless potential. Her voice, technique, approach to material deserve attention. A debut EP is always a risky enterprise, and Mian handled the task.

When travel is postponed for objective reasons, Off Script can become a temporary replacement. You turn on the EP – and move to another place, another time, another state. Lauren Mian offers a ticket to a journey where the schedule is written on the go, and the final destination is determined by intuition. Perhaps the wish will come true as unexpectedly as a star ignited above the horizon. Meanwhile, there remains music that reminds us: the road is more important than the destination.

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