Caroline in the Garden’s debut EP This Peak stares into a mirror made of synth and stardust, melancholy, mesmerizing, and full of glittering shadows. The Atlanta-based artist taps into the ghosts of 80s pop and 90s piano queens. From the first track, “The Underside,” you’re dropped into a dreamy abyss, where piano cascades like tears on porcelain and Caroline’s voice rises with raw, aching clarity. Her delivery is velvet and venom, tender yet pulsing with emotional electricity, while the backing vocals hover like sirens luring you deeper.
Then there’s the title track, “This Peak.” It’s a haunting slow burn built on hard-hitting beats, hushed piano, and vocals that start off cool and calculating before catching fire. It’s a mysterious, emotional climb that ends in a cathartic, voice-soaring crescendo, with electric guitars ringing out like alarm bells in a dream. The energy is elegant but uneasy, like dancing in stilettos on a cracked glass floor.
“Ennui” captures the American dream’s slow-burn disillusionment with eerie precision. It’s orchestral, brooding, and bitter in the best way. Caroline sings with the weight of too much time and not enough meaning, capturing modern emotional exhaustion in a velvet fist. As strings swell and her voice dissolves into trailing echoes, you’re left in a heavy-lidded daze.
And then, just when you think she’s done wrecking you, the “This Peak (Power Station Crystal Station Remix)” glides in like a glowing specter. It’s the original’s cooler, more cosmic cousin, waves of synth shimmer under muffled vocals that eventually rise to the heavens. Ethereal, hypnotic, and dripping with starlight, this remix is a perfect closer to an already spellbinding debut.
This Peak is a mood, a fever dream, a beautiful unraveling you’ll want to get lost in again and again.
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Review by: Naomi Joan