Butterflies

For more than a decade, Serengeti’s depictions and stories of his Kenny Dennis persona relied heavily on his relationship with his wife Jueles. Throughout their saga, we hear of a woman often discussed but never heard from, a source of love and frustration and obsession and, eventually, intense separation-anxiety longing. But with Butterflies, it turns out that Kenny isn’t the only partner in the couple who struggles with the ghosts of thwarted musical stardom. As depicted by singer Jade, Jueles’ own unearthed demo tape of electro jams and synth ballads is deceptively upbeat, at least musically; her singing voice has a smooth lilt that conceals the kind of barbs that producer Rob Kleiner gives punchy syndrum power. It might be an odd fit for the presumed indie rap audience that made Kenny’s name, but as a piece of a bigger story it makes sense; Kenny’s previously inexplicable attempts to reinvent himself as an early ‘90s hip-house throwback in his doomed side project Perfecto take on a different meaning when Jueles’ own in-universe album is the kind of HW Bush-era dance-pop/downtempo homage that conjures up memories of both Julee Cruise and Stacey Q. Unlike the Perfecto EP Serengeti released in 2015 as a bit of a good-natured goof, Butterflies doesn’t sound particularly parodic, even though there’s a remnant archness in some of the lyrical details; her Tom Selleck infatuation (“Tommy PI”), her frustration at Kenny’s underachieving personal rut (“Odouls”), and stray appearances by KDz himself (like a guest verse on happier-times husband-wife teamup “Places Places”) are still very much in the spirit of the story. Interludes and interjections complete the picture of a man who’s resigned to a life spent falling asleep to Perfect Strangers reruns as his wife laments his dead ambitions, culminating in a late run of tracks where Kenny’s breaking point in the relationship is blown up into a droning semi-industrial/kosmische meltdown before a closer by Jueles’ more successful pop-star sister pays her a loving tribute on “Wild Flower” — one that hints that she’s not just out of Kenny’s life, but gone for good.