Ashnikko - Possession of a Weapon (Initial Thoughts)

So, Ash's newest song from the Weedkiller album, called Possession of a Weapon, came out 10pm last night.

It is now 6:55am the next morning.

So I guess I slept on these thoughts and they're no longer initial, but you guys (the 0-5 who are reading this blog, apparently)... this one took some thinking. And I was hecking tired last night after an evening shift etc. life outside music.

First of all, I love it. I listen to Ash's music weekly, because I need it, and just yesterday I did and thought to myself "I wish she'd put out more music already, before I get sick of these old songs of hers". I had completely forgotten she was putting out a new song...

I think I try not to get myself too hyped about her music lately, because I am secretly a bit scared I'll get sick of it. The music is great, but not that nuanced (like, i.e. prog metal, my fave) Her lyrics are getting more complex, which I appreciate, and I haven't broken down all of her old song lyrics, either, so I think I could technically go and analyze every word and beat and everything before the album drops, but like... I think I'm sort of "saving it" for later. Her career is really taking off now, as we can see from the three country wide world tour, Coachella performance with the huge Weedkiller puppet, the budget of the music videos and how big the behind-the-scenes team of Ashnikko has become. So, she'll probably be putting out new music every 2-3 years after Weedkiller. Before Weedkiller, she's released 3 EPs, one mixtape, maybe about 8 promotional singles (i.e. the Halloweenie series) and been featured in about 10 songs. And there's maybe 10 songs she hasn't officially released but that are on YouTube anyway. And I've listened through all of it dozens of times in the past ~2 years I've been a fan. I'd consume more Ashnikko music than what is produced, basically, if I didn't restrict myself on the consumption, and then I'd get sick of it and not even check out the new stuff. So, I'm subconsciously ignoring it already and focusing mainly on other artists...

Anyway, thoughts on the newest song:

First of all, I love it. I was surprised to hear less in-your-face production than her usual songs - I'm gonna have to check later if Scheller produced this or if it was someone else, because this doesn't sound like him - and no rapping, even though it's not a ballad, either... Also have to check out where this is placed on the album... I have a theory on how the music genre is going to evolve throughout the album and I want to see if the position of this song supports my theory...

It's very Björk-esque pop, music-wise. But the singing is a bit more traditional than what I've heard Björk do. Ash and the music sound ethereal, beautiful...

Later on the song, definite Billie Eilish vibes... 

From the lyrics, one bar stood out to me: "don't rain on my paper mache". That was interesting. Quite typical Ashnikko bar - a bit weird and unconventional (in the sense that she uses expressions that I've never heard anyone else use), referencing 90s/2000s children's culture (I've never seen Zoomers or Alpha kids talking about paper mache?), but you still get the bar quite soon after hearing it.

"Don't rain on me" is a common expression, meaning "don't pour all your emotional problems on me". Paper mache is a form of art, especially loved by kids. If you would literally pour water on a literal paper mache art piece, it would become a pile of soaked paper goo. Water would ruin the art piece completely. So, someone else than Ash is pouring their emotions on her and it's affecting her art. Ruining her art. This could have happened in the past - paper mache is a kid's art thing, so it could have happened in her childhood. It could mean the ex she wrote about a lot in her previous work, how the emotions they had for each other after the break-up consumed her art. But then again, that music turned up good, it wasn't ruined... So it's probably not about him, not this time. Or it could be a recent event. Someone else's feelings being poured on Ash, who likes to pour her own emotions into her songs, and then that other person's feelings would leak into Ash's music too much and it wouldn't be her art anymore. This seems like the most likely scenario.