There are two kinds of
records in this world; those you can commute to and those you can listen to*.
That may be an oversimplification and of course there is a bit of overlap, but Princess One Point Five's What Doesn’t Kill You definitely feels
like a commuting album.

"Today" wouldn’t be
out of place setting the scene for some weary office worker on a tin-can to the
CBD, looking meaningfully out the window and asking themselves, indeed, “What
the hell is with today, today?”. Or perhaps a long ride home on an all-stations
service, clinging to the sullen verse-chorus-verse of "What Do You Know" as the
sun retreats behind housing commission blocks in the distance.

"All You Are" has an
intro that summons thoughts of Carl Sagan-esque educational astronomy programs,
while "Quote Me" would be right at home played live on ABC’s Recovery (now
defunct, sadly) with a pierced Dylan Lewis hovering somewhere in the background,
and backs up the sort of naïve 90s charm heard elsewhere on the record. I say
90s mostly because the similarities between this and Frente, and furthermore, between Sarah Jane Wentzki’s and Angie Hart’s vocals, are far too pronounced to be overlooked.
Ditto for
Sally Seltmann (New Buffalo) and Lenka Kripac (Decoder Ring). "Fly My
Pretties" sounds like an uneasy combination of Nat King Cole’s "Nature Boy" and
Massive Attack’s "Unfinished Sympathy", which in theory sounds like sonic gold, but
mostly just feels like less than the sum of its parts.

Having said all that,
the album kind of grows on you. Production that seemed cheesy at first latches
onto those nostalgic hooks in your heart, lyrics that seemed ham-fisted become
well-worn observations, and vocals that seemed breathless and nasal, well, they
still feel like that, but you take the bitter with the better.

6.5/10

*May not be entirely
true.