Jane Remover's 'Census Designated' is a fever dream in the best way possible.
The 20-year-old genre-bender continues to impress with her hazy sophomore album.
We are currently living in the age of the independent musician thanks to the Internet making it easier than ever to create music and build a following with it online. Additionally, due to the virtually unlimited access and resources that the Internet provides, popular artists from across all fields have gotten younger and younger and more and more talented, and that is absolutely the case for American singer-songwriter, producer, and tastemaker Jane Remover.
A fascinating figure on the underground pop music scene, Jane Remover began posting music online via SoundCloud in 2019 when she was just 16 years old and has put out tons of music under various aliases, most notably Leroy and Dltzk. She’s perhaps best known for pioneering “Dariacore” — a microgenre of hyper pop based on the iconic TV character of the same name that’s characterized by sped-up, pitch-shifted samples and mash-ups of pop music combined with elements of other niche genres like nightcore, breakcore, and Jersey club — with her cult album of the same name and its sequels, which she released as Leroy between 2021 and 2022.
After releasing her official debut album, Frailty (2021), as Dltzk along with a smattering of EPs and standalone singles under her many other pseudonyms, she introduced the “Jane Remover” moniker in June 2022 with the song “Royal Blue Walls”, announced the retirement of her past aliases, and subsequently distanced herself from her previous projects in favor of her official sophomore record and first as Jane Remover, Census Designated.
Released last month, Census Designated contrasts the colorful, high-energy hyper pop and digicore soundscape of Frailty with its dark, brooding atmosphere and psychedelic folk and gothic Americana production that explores genres ranging from dream rock (“Cage Girl / Camgirl”) and shoegaze (“Lips”) to noise rock (“Contingency Song”) and grunge (“Idling Somewhere”) to even trip-hop (“Fling”) and screamo (“Backseat Girl”).
Jane Remover has always been a genre-bender, and on Census Designated, she masterfully blends all of these sounds into an epic, dizzying fever dream that’s all-encompassing and slightly overwhelming at times in a very similar fashion to American singer-songwriter, producer, and rising alternative pop icon Ethel Cain’s unbelievable debut album, Preacher’s Daughter (2022). Coincidently, Preacher’s Daughter is one of Census Designated’s primary influences as shared by Remover herself in an interview with Stereogum, and while there are certainly similarities, Remover takes the ethereal Southern Gothic and dark Americana sound presented on Preacher’s Daughter and makes it her own with ambient electronic elements that add a fuzzy quality to the record, giving it the feel of something that’s being played on an old gramophone lost to time in a dilapidated house in the middle of nowhere — much like the one depicted in the album cover.
In a press release to accompany the record, Remover stated that Census Designated was largely inspired by a cross-country road trip that she took in early 2022 — during which she had a “near-death experience” when she was forced to stop in John Day, Oregon after getting caught in a blizzard, prompting a “reality check” that made her “want to stop ruining things for [herself]” — as well as nightmares that she’s had about her subconscious fears manifesting in real life. Lyrically, Census Designated discusses toxic, detrimental relationships (“Holding A Leech” and “Always Have Always Will”) and her coming-of-age as a young Trans woman who grew up on the Internet (“Census Designated” and “John Doe Song” — a vinyl exclusive bonus track).
A song that I especially want to highlight is “Video” — an arresting noise rock number that tells the story of a young woman becoming infatuated with a man she met online who ends up taking advantage of her when they finally meet in person. It’s a cautionary tale that not only shines a light on the experience of young women online but on the very unfortunate yet far too common occurrence of young Queer kids who, due to a lack of proper sexual education paired with the tolls that discrimination and lack of access to identity-affirming connections take on their mental health, wind getting up getting groomed by much older people over the Internet. I applaud Jane Remover for touching on such an important issue within the Queer community that likely she, someone she knows, or both have almost certainly faced directly.
Jane Remover has expressed feeling dissatisfied with her previous work, taking the criticism directed at Frailty’s recording and mixing quality to improve upon her sound and create what is no doubt her most accomplished body of work to date. At just 20 years old, Remover has produced a breathtaking and sublime magnum opus that showcases her immense talent and wisdom far beyond her years — not to mention her range! Going from something as zany and ironic as Dariacore to something as heavy and grounded as Census Designated is already quite impressive, but the fact that she more or less wrote and produced this entire album by herself blows my mind! It’s clear that after spending several years honing her craft; discovering her sound; and finding her artistic identity, Jane Remover has fully come into her own.
Census Designated is available now across all online and streaming platforms!
Watch the music video for “Census Designated”: