Pirouette Unleashed: Model/Actriz Expands Post-Punk Sound in Emancipation-Themed Album

“The way sound influences the body is central to our thought process,” Cole Haden, the vocalist of Model/Actriz, shared with us in 2023. This philosophy clearly remains unchanged. Two years after the release of Dogsbody—a debut album marked by industrial tones and tension—the Brooklyn band explores a dark, sultry New York with Pirouette, an album whose title alone suggests it’s not meant for sitting still.

After all, how can one free themselves from their demons, heal old wounds, and don a crimson shield if they are stuck in a static state? The quartet understands that such progress can only be achieved through movement and the discomfort of delving into traumatic memories.

Shedding Shame

Pirouette is, in this respect, a decidedly cathartic album. Cole Haden’s lyrics are even more introspective, recalling a childhood marred by shame. This includes the shame he later swept away of not aligning with gender stereotypes imposed from birth and dreaming of a Cinderella-themed birthday party at age five—only to retract and retreat into silence, “alone and devastated,” as he sings in Cinderella.

This also includes the shame of confiding his homosexuality to a friend in middle school, falling for one of the boys in their group of friends, and suffering from it. “Over time, I began to hate him, or rather hate myself,” he whispers in Headlights, an interlude where industrial slashes move in synthetic waves.

Yet, Pirouette is not devoid of light. What unfolds across the eleven tracks is a true assertion of power—a departure from the typical musical palette assigned to post-punk, here much more nuanced. Cole Haden and his band—Ruben Radlauer (drums), Aaron Shapiro (bass), and Jack Wetmore (guitar)—do not merely serve us their noisy salvos; the guitars sometimes soften (Acid Rain), as do the vocals, soaring gently (Poppy, Baton).

A Manifesto for Emancipation

The lyrics resonate as a true manifesto for emancipation. “I put on my platforms/I put on my skirt/I pull the straps over my shoulders/I pull out the red from my bag/All I want is to be beautiful,” Cole Haden details in Departures. These words echo his pre-show ritual: meticulously applying lipstick at the start of each concert, facing the audience. “A way to tell myself, and the audience, that the show is starting,” he explained two years earlier.

He dedicates specifically the track Audience to his stage experience. Being in the spotlight appears as both a salvation and a duty to perform, an escape as purifying as it is toxic. “There are angels watching over everything/And they will send me straight to reform school for a poor performance,” Cole sings. To give everything on stage or nothing at all, following in the footsteps of pop singers who shaped his imagination as a teen—Liza Minnelli, Patti LuPone, Lady Gaga, Gwen Stefani… Artists he listened to, admired, and eventually drew inspiration from.

Thus, his recent collaboration with Miley Cyrus, for whom he co-wrote Prelude, the opening track of the Tennessee singer’s upcoming album, comes as no surprise. Who says musical genres must stay in their respective lanes? Sometimes, it only takes a pirouette from one to another.

Pirouette (True Panther Records/Dirty Hit). Release on May 2. In concert at Petit Bain, June 17.