Sycco’s “Time’s Up” Counts the Clock Down on Love

Sycco’s music has always felt, to some extent, like entering a mirage or a different plane of consciousness, and “Time’s Up” is no different. The opening synth drifts between the same two notes in a heartbroken daze (“Took all that I loved / And turned off all the lights”), hazy and narcotic; two guitars clash in the chorus, one propulsive and impatient, the other steeped in afternoon languor. By the time the indie-pop singer gets to the second verse, the production short-circuits with electronic stutters, her voice dripping with embittered AutoTune: “You don’t wanna fuck with me / No, you don’t wanna fuck with things.” And she’s only halfway through.

The song’s not all technicolor sensory overload. When the bridge arrives in its almost ambient-techno calm, heartbeat-still, Sycco becomes meditative — but it’s only temporary reprieve. The next second, synths whizz back in to unleash the last chorus, each instrument brighter and more rampant than before. “The song definitely reflects the emotional turbulence and anger I was feeling during lockdown,” says Sycco, but at the song’s end, she finds peace. “Our time is up,” she sings with a smile, “You can’t accept that you just weren’t enough.”