Strange World by St. Panther

St. Panther is the recording project of Dani Bojorges-Giraldo (they/them), a Mexican/Colombian artist, producer, singer, rapper, and multi-instrumentalist living in East Los Angeles. Strange World, a new EP of soulful modern pop songs, marks St. Panther’s first release with art-forward label partner drink sum wtr. A striking return and sign of what’s to come, Strange World reignites the excited simmer that surrounded their 2020 breakout debut EP, These Days. Smooth, dynamic, and super-charged with emotion, the songs of Strange World search for purpose, security, and love — notions that are ever at odds with the speed of today’s uncertain landscape. “We’ll never be the same / But I’m still rooting for us,” they sing on the title track, lending a statement of intent for a set that thrives in realness and hope.

A St. Panther song can move between soul, R&B, jazz, hip-hop, or alt-pop; what makes it theirs is an ear for inventive, inviting production and an unmistakable voice. Whether raspy or silky, crooning or rapping, that drawl contains pure charisma, joy, and grit. Their ability to tap into life’s vibrance as much as its pain places them within a rarified throughline of expressive pop greats from Wonder to Winehouse.

Five years is a long time in this strange world, and Bojorges-Giraldo used it wisely, making space to grow as an artist and person, to record, and to “become a part of my village,” they explain. “I've spent so many years making music and making noise endlessly and kind of just shouting into this echo chamber that never ends. But I took this long pause to really listen to my village, listen to the needs of my community, and the people around me. We're all feeling the weight of the world on our shoulders a bit. We want hope, you know, for our listeners, we want people to feel heard and that there's someone out there representing this feeling.”

The opening piano vignette “Brand New” reintroduces the project. “Before, I was a little bit more guarded to let people into the deep space of my story and my life...I'm ready to open a completely new door. I'm letting the outside world into that.” Here, St. Panther is stationed at the keys, in their apartment studio in Boyle Heights, which they lovingly describe as “literally the ricketiest setup ever.” Strange World sessions were split between that familiar setting and a new one, Haven Sound, the Burbank studio run by co-producer Chris McClenney (H.E.R., Khalid, Jamila Woods). They credit McClenney’s presence for pushing them forward sonically, “just to reference each other and pick apart the things that we can make more modern and push this music a little further.”

“American Dreams” gets to “the why” for Bojorges-Giraldo, who found themselves questioning the roots of their ambition, their relationship to technology, and their place in the world, coming up in a first-generation immigrant family, and as a trans person in a country where safety is constantly compromised. Over slow marching drums and guitar, they deliver stanzas on doom scrolling and the daily grind. In contrast to the capitalist dream, St. Panther is here for human success. “I want our communities to succeed in caring about each other.”

They kick up the tempo for “Strange World”, featuring past collaborator Rae Khalil and co-written with Erik Bodin of Little Dragon, replete with punchy percussion, shuffling bass, organ stabs, and finger snaps. “The Deal” is a lounge-y love ballad that finds St. Panther at their most raw, in a D’Angelo mode of tender, reflecting in the clarity of a breakup gone good; “it changed me foundationally as a person. In all the best ways.”

Strange World closes on “Whoever Said Silence is Peace”, a pointed, piano-hooked outro that started like many St. Panther songs do, from intimate experience, “then they gain more context over time.” Great pop music often holds a mirror to generations, and St. Panther does so here with timeless ease.
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