A quick guide to Cindy Lee's Polaris-shortlisted album, Diamond Jubilee
The Calgary drag artist's unconventional release led to one of the year's most talked about success stories
Cindy Lee's seventh studio album, Diamond Jubilee, is one of this year's 10 Polaris Music Prize-nominated albums, and CBC Music's Shortlist Shortcut series is back to help music fans learn the key details about each shortlisted record.
Dig into the stories behind the Calgary drag artist's album, the tracks you need to know, and the perfect summer activities to complement your listening.
You can also listen to The Ten radio special on Diamond Jubilee here.
Artist:
Cindy Lee.
Album:
Diamond Jubilee.
Polaris Music Prize history:
This is Cindy Lee's first time on the Polaris short list; their fifth studio album, What's Tonight to Eternity, was longlisted in 2020. Patrick Flegel, who is behind the Cindy Lee moniker, was also longlisted twice before (2009, 2011) in their previous band Women.
Story behind the nominated album:
It's not easy to cultivate a sense of mystery in the age of social media, but that's what Cindy Lee did for their latest album, Diamond Jubilee. Released on March 29, this double album was nowhere to be found on the usual streaming platforms, but instead only available for download on a GeoCities website and as a YouTube video upload with no song breaks. As of this writing, Cindy Lee has stopped doing interviews with the press and has cancelled their remaining tour dates for the year. Some believe this may be the end of Cindy Lee, but that too remains a mystery.
To call Cindy Lee a complete mystery is inaccurate, though. Diamond Jubilee is, in fact, their seventh studio album. And the musician behind this drag persona, Patrick Flegel, is well known to fans of their other projects, Androgynous Mind and, most notably, the Calgary post-punk band Women. Flegel has performed as Cindy Lee for over a decade now, but the reception to their latest release has thrust them into a new level of fame and recognition, landing them in front of many music fans who are just discovering Cindy Lee for the first time. After all, Diamond Jubilee arrived on the same day as other blockbuster releases by Beyoncé, Sum 41, J-Hope and Machine Gun Kelly, yet it received the highest Pitchfork review score not only that week, but the site's best score in four years.
"This may be the greatest radio station you've ever come across," that review opens with, sparking a string of descriptions calling Diamond Jubilee a transmission from another world. Its sounds are familiar — drawing on a smorgasbord of influences ranging from '60s girl groups and Velvet Underground to psychedelia and '90s indie-rock — but tangled together in a way that feels hard to place, it's composed with such obsessive meticulousness yet it plays out with eerie ease. While Diamond Jubilee sounds lighter than Cindy Lee's previous releases, which carried a heavier and darker mood, this album is seeped in melancholy and longing as most songs are driven by heartbreak. Perhaps more cutting than the album's many standout guitar solos is Flegel's gut-wrenching songwriting, like when they sing, "Sometimes I see you in my dreams/ Where I can be with you again," on the distorted Beach Boys reverie, "Dreams of You."
With its two-hour runtime, Diamond Jubilee is a colossal collection of songs. "I just wanna purge a bunch of this stuff that I've got… get that out of my system," Flegel said in a rare interview with Lebronjames.co last year. It's their fourth album in four years, but Flegel has assumed control of their release strategy by putting records out on their own label, Realistik Studios, in addition to circumventing traditional streaming platforms. Flegel has been praised for their decision to keep Diamond Jubilee off of services that pay their artists a meagre wage. In that same interview, they clearly stated their intentions to go rogue: "I think everyone should take their music off streaming platforms. Not even strike, just take it off. They're begging for a penny a play, and it's pitiful… It's kinda similar to every other job where you think you should get a raise, and you probably should, and you just don't. I don't think it's exceptional to music, but it still is bullshit."
While not every artist can afford to protest like this, Cindy Lee's monumental release this year will hopefully inspire others to rethink and question the status quo in the music industry right now. Diamond Jubilee is a testament to DIY culture and betting on yourself.
Notable players:
Diamond Jubilee is largely a solo endeavour, with Flegel writing all the lyrics and composing every song, except for "Baby Blue," which was co-written with Steven Lind of the Canadian duo, Freak Heat Waves. (Freak Heat Waves opened for Cindy Lee on their most recent tour before Flegel cancelled its remaining tour dates in May.) Lind also contributes guitar, bass, drums, synths, strings and claps throughout the album, with additional help in engineering, production and mixing. The only other person credited on Diamond Jubilee is Joshua Stevenson, who mastered the album and has worked with Cindy Lee on their previous albums, What's Tonight to Eternity and Act of Tenderness.
Standout songs:
'Glitz'
The second track off of Diamond Jubilee's first disc, "Glitz" offers an early punch of glam-rock that puts its fuzz-out guitars front and centre as Flegel's voice hovers beneath like a ghostly figure. It's a bright, psychedelic number that sinks its teeth into you early on, showing just one of many exciting sounds the album experiments with.
'All I Want Is You'
Many of the songs on Diamond Jubilee capture the feeling of heartbreak, and "All I Want Is You" perfectly encapsulates a longing for someone as Flegel admits on the chorus: "All I've got is the truth/ All I want is you." (It's a refrain that even repeats later on the album.) The track's melancholic tone is balanced out by a standout guitar solo, highlighting one of Flegel's greatest strengths as a musician, bursting onto this track like a powerful ray of serotonin-packed sunshine.
'Gayblevision'
An early song off of the album's second disc, the instrumental track "Gayblevision" acts as a sonic reset. Its heavy, grooving synths keep listeners on their toes as Flegel swerves in yet another new direction. Uncut described this transition as "moving from the bedroom to the nightclub," with the album entering a more nocturnal mode.
Recommended if you like:
The Ronettes, the Shangri-las, the Beach Boys, Velvet Underground, T. Rex, Yo La Tengo, Ariel Pink, Women.
Summer activity pairing:
With its lengthy runtime, Diamond Jubilee is an album to ideally put on during those easygoing slow Sunday mornings, perhaps paired with your first sip of coffee and that book you've been meaning to start reading.
Don't miss Shortlist Summer: a season-long showcase of the 10 albums shortlisted for the 2024 Polaris Music Prize. Read the weekly Polaris Shortlist Shortcut feature at cbcmusic.ca/polaris and tune into The Ten radio special every Sunday night at 6 p.m. (6:30 NT) at cbc.ca/listen.
