20. Measure of a Man (ft Central Cee) (2021)
An unexpected diversion. From spy action movie The King’s Man, Measure of a Man goes full Bond theme to impressive effect: high drama, big strings, lyrics that romantically depict a tortured tough guy in soft-focus, until Central Cee’s guest verse breaks the cinematic spell with a dose of street reportage.
19. Drums of Death (2024)
Most of the songs thus far released from FKA twigs’ forthcoming album Eusexua suggest a shift towards more straightforward commerciality. However, Drums of Death – an immense rhythm track, vocals that glitch and stutter in a way that mimics the disorientation of a hedonism-fuelled dancefloor at 4am – suggests experimentation is still very much on the menu.
18. Give Up (2014)
The best version of Give Up might be the one that exists only on fan-shot live videos – and the BBC’s Glastonbury coverage – from 2015, where the track erupts into a remix of Madonna’s Vogue. Still, the original studio version is pretty great, its chorus as close to straightforward pop as the LP1 album got.
17. Mirrored Heart (2019)
Mirrored Heart poses an interesting question after a failed relationship: is the ideal partner just someone you see yourself reflected in? The music, meanwhile, sounds like it’s falling apart as FKA twigs’ voice floats above it: a piano fighting for space against a funereal industrial beat, plus fragments of noise and guitar.
16. Video Girl (2014)
Before she was a solo artist, Tahliah Barnett worked as a dancer for Kylie Minogue, Ed Sheeran and Jessie J among others – a period of her life that Video Girl suggests was filled with thwarted ambition and rejection. Winningly, the accompanying video was profoundly disturbing, the work of someone now operating entirely on their own terms.
15. Water Me (2013)
The lead track from FKA twigs’ second EP offers a neat explanation of her appeal: the music is glitchy, atonal, atmospheric and challenging, but it’s allied to lyrics that deal in the straightforwardly relatable: “He won’t make love to me now / I guess I’m stuck with myself.”
14. Eusexua (2024)
FKA twigs has worked with umpteen collaborators, but, nevertheless, the appearance of venerable DJ hero Sasha in the credits of Eusexua came as a surprise: less so when you hear the track, apparently inspired by a rave in Prague, which carries a distinct echo of the trance-y progressive house which was his late 90s trademark.
13. Hide (2012)
The killer cut from FKA twigs’ first EP, and the perfect calling card, a ballad where rhythms, echoing guitar samples, her voice all sound intriguingly out of phase with each other. The result is alternately confusing, hypnotically atmospheric, strangely moving and completely fresh. Who was this?
12. Tears in the Club (ft the Weeknd) (2021)
It says something about FKA twigs’ imposing artistic vision that she can tap one of the world’s biggest stars for a guest spot and not be overshadowed: the Weeknd is here in a supporting role, more-or-less shadowing her voice as Tears in the Club strikes a weirdly appealing balance between sensuality and heartbreak.
11. In Time (2015)
A devastating portrait not of a break-up, but the excruciating period immediately before one, when the realisation that everything is going wrong battles against hope springing eternal. That struggle is reflected in the wilfully cluttered sound and a vocal that shifts from tender supplication to an anguished, half-rapped snarl.
10. Pendulum (2014)
In a pop world big on immediacy, FKA twigs’ singles boldly deal primarily in subtlety, and Pendulum is the perfect example. Between the sound of her harmonising with herself and the dragging beat lurk textures and atmospheres rich with tiny detail: a song that keeps revealing something new on every listen.
9. Oh My Love (2022)
Preceded by the spoken word saga of the singer’s relationship with a wrong’un who invited her to “a family barbecue” then announced “you’re not my girl”, Oh My Love spins hazy guitar and warped vocals into beautiful, regretful slow motion, before a friend intervenes with advice: “Fuck crying over these stupid boys!”
8. Glass & Patron (2015)
An ode to MDMA-and-tequila-fuelled hedonism (“shut your eyes and feel the rush,” she offers at one juncture, like an old-skool ’ardcore MC) that, musically, seems less about evoking euphoria than too-much-of-everything commotion. Drums boom explosively, rave-y sirens erupt at random, and sampled voices chatter, whisper and stutter. Weird, but thrilling.
7. Holy Terrain (ft Future) (2019)
“I love sad Future,” FKA twigs explained of her decision to give the rapper the only feature on album Magdelene, and to deploy him in uncertain, pleading mode: “I hope you never take my love in vain.” Meanwhile a trap beat clacks and clatters, dark electronic textures swirl, and FKA twigs demands undying fealty, not a man “bound up by his boys and his chains”.
6. Mothercreep (2015)
Apparently, it’s about being suffused with regret at her dismissive teenage treatment of her mum, but Mothercreep is all about the supremely disturbing music, courtesy of FKA twigs and sometime Beyoncé collaborator Boots: a nightmare of sickly, discordant electronics, disjointed rhythms and, early on, 10 seconds of eerie complete silence.
5. Fallen Alien (2019)
The power of Fallen Alien lies in the way it builds – sonically and emotionally – from quiet piano, throwing disparate sounds together until the listener thinks it’s peaked around two minutes in. But it’s a feint: the real explosion of bad-boyfriend-induced rage comes at the end, furious, conflicted and cathartic.
4. Papi Pacify (2013)
Desire turns sickly on Papi Pacify: “Tell me you’re the one I can call, even if you choke,” is a very disturbing plea for commitment. The soundscape conjured with producer Arca amplifies the mood: there’s a point, a minute from the end, where the singer sounds literally overwhelmed by its churning din.
3. Home With You (2019)
Home With You drags the listener along on quite the dramatic journey. Lyrically, musically and vocally, it variously manages to sound angry, weary, regretful, scornful, swaggering, needy and oddly becalmed: a week’s worth of emotions crammed into less than four minutes, held together by an implausibly pretty, fragile chorus.
2. Two Weeks (2014)
Compared with a lot of music on FKA twigs’ preceding EPs, Two Weeks was relatively straightforward, a lubricious R&B slow jam – “get your mouth open, you know you’re mine” – albeit one viewed through her idiosyncratic distorting lens: a fabulous melody draped around huge EDM synths.
1. Cellophane (2019)
From the start, FKA twigs’ music has existed at one remove from everything else that’s happening in pop, in its own out-there world. So it might seem counterintuitive to top a list crammed with risk-taking with something as prosaic as a straightforward piano ballad, but Cellophane is just an extraordinarily beautiful and moving song. Moreover, it focuses attention on her voice, which sounds astonishing throughout. And, by stripping away all the attention-grabbing sonic experimentation that’s always been her USP, and presenting herself almost completely unadorned, it represents a kind of risk-taking in itself: a risk that pays off to stunning effect.
