Susan Styleโs debut album Only a broken heart can hold the world unravels a story, then stitches it back together in unexpected ways. Moving between Taipei and London, she turns personal upheaval into something expansive, using electronic art-pop as her language of transformation. It turns out that the album ends up both intimate and otherworldly, like paging through a diary written in sound.
It all begins with โThe Hope from the Dream,โ which steps through a sonic doorway. Two voices seem to hover and speak across space while blurred, bounding beats pulse beneath shimmering, clinking synths. Itโs immersive, almost disorienting at firstโbut thatโs the hook.
Then โAll Things Newโ flips the switch a bit. Here, Susan blends delicate Mandarin phonetics with a pulsing 80s-inspired synth-pop backbone, and it just clicks. The track carries this sense of renewal, like sunrise after a long, restless night.
The title track, โOnly a Broken Heart Can Hold the World,โ acts as the albumโs emotional and sonic centerpiece. It brings a bedlam of textures while being wildly cinematic, as layers of percussive taps, gunshots,ย animalistic echoes, and swelling synths collide and scatter. And then, out of nowhere, everything drops into stillness. A deep string drone hums, waves rush in, and suddenly the chaos feels resolved, like heartbreak exhaling.
โWeird In A Good Wayโ experiments rebelliously, as its driving pulse and off-kilter structure feel made for dim-lit rooms and crowded dancefloors, where losing yourself is kind of the whole point.
By the time โA Flingโ rolls in, things soften. Bright, dreamy melodies and a warm, thumping beat carry her husky, playful vocals as she gushes over a person with perfect sweetness.
All in all, this album proves that, sometimes, breaking apart is exactly how you grow.
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Review by: Naomi Joan