Blistering synths instantly disorient the ears once “Hear the Message” begins. Riley emerges towering, with a speak-singing cadence like The Fall’s Mark E. Smith, while a tangible, rhythmic groove quickly reveals itself. His observational fragments ground the warped atmosphere as something weirdly poetic and assuring, remarkable given its short length.
“I’m someone who looks for a lot of patterns to explain the world and myself. When I don’t see those patterns resolve themselves, I get into a little bit of a spiral,” Riley explains. “I wanted to explore how that relates to real life, in the disconnect between what’s going on in your head and what you see.” When “Hear the Message” finally gains momentum, it turns out it was never disorienting in the first place: Riley finds grace in himself and how his brain works within the off-kilter haze. “An observer is something I’ve always felt comfortable being.”
The scorching tune is one of six restless electro-belters on Riley’s debut EP, , out 23 October. Each is like the Pet Shop Boys’ earnest songwriting contorted by Nine Inch Nails’ pummelling sound. This music treads new territory compared to Ribbon Skirt’s conscious indie rock, where Riley’s role is a songwriter and guitarist alongside Tashiina Buswa. It turns out this harsher music isn’t new for Riley, who’s played in post-punk bands over the years, sometimes even singing.
“Last summer, I was going out to a lot of places where I was getting exposed to a lot of new electronic and dance music,” he recalls. “I think making electronic music was always something that intimidated me quite a lot.” Given the boisterous timbre, Riley’s nerves may seem unconvincing, but this is the first time he’s done a project on his own. At some point while watching such bands, something suddenly clicked, and he felt he could make this arresting music himself. “I think I was also missing that catharsis of singing,” he says. “You’re going a little bit harder.”
Ironically, it was with Ribbon Skirt that Riley started exploring more electronic sounds. Their album and its epilogue EP revealed what biting, propulsive post-punk riffs can become when mixed with intricate textures. Preoccupations’ Scott “Monty” Munro lent his prowess to Ribbon Skirt and to Perfect Outfit, and Riley, inspired, took it further. “I gave myself a little challenge: no guitar on the EP. I didn’t want to fall back on stuff I’m comfortable with. I wanted to create something new. That was important for me to push myself.”
While assembling Perfect Outfit, Riley was naturally concerned about sounding too robotic. “I always struggled to see how I could make electronic music sound human,” he admits. Yet Riley’s references prove he’s wearing the right attire: the beautiful simplicity of Suicide marrying affecting lyrics with scathing noise; the attitude of Happy Mondays’ alt-dance; and the dark, laboured-over modern techno of Debit all show how the artificial can sound human. Even the artwork by designer Juliette Dupont-Duchesne exists in an uncanny space between the digital and real world. Riley excels at powering this electronic music with organic tissue.
Riley’s projects are both loosely related by name, too, given the clothing motif. “What you choose to wear means something,” he says. He does admit he hadn’t noticed that connection between the two bands. However, he explains that his solo name is derived from a misremembered line in the 1975 documentary : “The way we present ourselves to the world and what we choose to present, in whatever we decide, is a perfect outfit for whatever occasion.”
Clothing then becomes a fascinating way for Riley to express his inner world, perhaps more transparently than his tense songs. “Going back to the connection between what’s going on in my head and the outside world, I think the clothes you wear are a good bridge between those two things: what you want to present to the world and how the world sees you,” he muses. Riley is searching for clarity in an often chaotic world and is now inviting others to follow suit.