Wicked Game- Lingua Ignota (orig. by Chris Isaak)

(Single) (Industrial) (Noise) (Neoclassical)

Lingua Ignota, a singer/songwriter from California/Rhode Island, released her debut LP, Caligula, last year, and has been riding a wave of some rising attention within the underground music community as a result. She has found herself particularly resonating within the metal scene, due to her occasionally vicious, screaming vocals, and her overall emphasis on intense performance, and instrumentalism.

With her latest single, a cover of Wicked Games by Chris Isaak, we find her recording possibly the most mainstream appealing song she has dropped so far, and I don’t mean that in a bad way at all. Something within the simplicity of the song, allowed for her to bring all of her usual tricks to the table—her atmospheric piano playing, her powerful vibratos, etc.—as well as creating one of Ignota’s most digestible songs to the more casual listener.

In terms of choosing what song to cover, I appreciate Ignota going outside of what I would imagine her influences are; I don’t see Chris Isaak, a heavily underrated country singer from the 90s, being high on the list of artists that influenced her style, but I could be wrong. Regardless, Ignota stays true to the haunting melody of the song, and completely makes it her own by drawing it even further into its own horrors.

Give the track a listen:

https://open.spotify.com/track/7DDiBgGyzVASJuhxtLt3ni?si=aXprXNs8Q9-k7uaHHReFJg