ÊMIA’s “Bet You Left It Out” Is Messy and Effervescent

If the usual piano-ballad response to heartbreak is like eating a pint of ice cream, then ÊMIA has no problem throwing the entire refrigerator at you. That is not to say balladry is absent on her newest single, “Bet You Left It Out”. Stick around until the two-minute mark, and you’ll find her own “drivers license” moment, left alone at the end of the cul-de-sac and all. But the road there is an effervescent jumble—full of technicolor synth stutter and glitches, gated drums, crisp handclaps, grainy foot stomps, and an electric guitar solo made for bedroom air-guitaring. 

It’s kitchen-sink pop that, at times, shudders and clatters like Foxes’ “Love Not Loving You,” rattling and restless to move on, but the Vietnamese-American singer-songwriter leaves room for melancholy, too. She’ll fling side-eyeing pettiness in one line (“But I’m taking out the trash ‘cause what you did was trashy”), high-road well wishes the next (“I hope you’re happy”), toeing the line between spite and sympathy. They’re messy feelings for a messy song, promises of “forever” swept from under ÊMIA’s feet. At least one thing’s for sure, though: On the rollercoaster that is romance, ÊMIA will be buckled up right beside you.