Last spring, a chilly single appeared on the @dennafrancesglass’s YouTube channel titled “Unabomber”. This would be the first of a handful of songs to come from World Music’s group The Crying Nudes. “Unabomber” is a greyscale love poem backed by a beautifully dainty and minimal acoustic guitar track. The group’s style is rooted in simplicity, which, in this case, is defined by a couple guitars, a barely punchy drum pattern, and a shy angel’s voice. This blueprint carries on throughout the subsequent tracks released over the past year. 

In the weeks following the group’s mysterious YouTube-debut-single release, “Unabomber” appeared on streaming services accompanied by “Unabomber II”. The moody sequel consists of a chopped guitar tune that perfectly carries the reverb-heavy vocals which ring out like a lovelorn siren reciting her diary aloud in an empty cathedral. The Crying Nudes would continue to release music sporadically and without official announcement for the next year. The existing collection, in addition to a new 50 second track, was compiled and released as a self-titled album a few weeks ago on September 6th, 2024. The Crying Nudes create an extremely nuanced, blue colored atmosphere that puts the listener on an outer city street during a cold winter afternoon. Their stripped back, lo-fi production and fleeting track length keep us craving for a trip back to the moonlit landscape they deliver us to, which is why the group’s enigmatic release schedule comes off as so bittersweet. 

This cryptic and anti-industry way of maneuvering is not uncommon for the World Music label – created by Dean Blunt, who is in no way new to these labels. Despite the overwhelming rapidity of today’s music industry where hurling trend-chasing singles into the void is commonplace, The Crying Nudes and other World Music entities alike try to simply exist in it (which you can quite literally hear in the reverb). On a shady YouTube channel the band makes its echoes, which are picked up by fans and carried as far as they may go, whether it’s reuploaded in case the original is deleted (a common occurrence) or stored on an archive page by a passionate World Music historian (@world___music__ on Instagram) before making it onto streaming platforms.

The band’s lead singer was pseudo-confirmed to be Copenhagen-based Fine Glindvad after she reposted The Crying Nudes’ first live show announcement on Instagram, although some fans caught on after she performed a cover of “Unabomber” at one of her live shows prior. Glindvad’s angelically delicate delivery heard on The Crying Nudes tracks persists through her solo work under the Fine moniker and in her other more pop-heavy group CHINAH. Many projects under the World Music label tend to involve Dean Blunt himself, typically meaning that he is directly behind the production. The smoky room that is Blunt’s extensive discography is a much larger can of worms for another time.

I urge you, if you have yet to come across them, to indulge in The Crying Nudes. Although they only have ~15 minutes of music out there, it is sure to be a fitting soundtrack to your brisk autumn walk being kissed by the cold wind. To me, they are the cold bus stop that internet-era music listeners need in this moment. Contemporary music today is so often digested in impersonal, 30 second increments. The Crying Nudes, while such a small tundra in the vast landscape of modern music, are an oasis of intimacy and vulnerability. You can find the band’s self-titled album on Apple Music, Spotify, and Bandcamp.