Marci Marci

A great pop record is like a great friend: an intimate confidante, a shoulder to cry on, and a partner in crime when you're ready to get dolled up and dance the pain away under the disco ball (or in front of your bedroom mirror.) That's what you'll find on MARCI, the solo debut from Marta Cikojevic of Montreal soft-rock group TOPS, who steps out on her own in self-assured style with a guileless collection of synth pop songs that brim with unabashed sincerity. The confidence of this debut belies the fact that Cikojevic has never formally written songs before, though she's been a student of melody since her childhood in rural Ontario, when she would sing along to the radio pop divas du jour, perform in the church choir, and participate in piano recitals. The middle child of five sisters, Cikojevic describes herself as a shy singer at home, who would instead seek out secret spots_the forest behind her home or a broken down van on their property were favorites_to practice her singing and record the songs she would make up herself into a handheld recorder. She was encouraged to do so by her grandfather, a refugee from the former Yugoslavia, who would sing and record both original songs and traditional Croatian folk songs on a cassette dictation machine_she still has some of the tapes they made together. Eventually she would make her way to Toronto where she played in several groups before joining TOPS as a keyboardist in 2017 and moving to Montreal. When she decided to make a solo record, it was a given that she'd work with her TOPS bandmate David Carriere, describing him as "a great pop writer" who shared her vision for what she wanted to achieve with her music.Carrierre and Cikojevic approached MARCI with the idea that they wanted to craft hits_songs that were catchy and danceable while still being emotionally honest and down-to-earth. The record was put together over the course of a year in a Montreal apartment reminiscent of a 1993 pawnshop, full of synthesizers and obscure instruments dating back to the...