You don’t all the time know what Horsegirl are singing about, however somebody within the group does. Maybe greater than something, their sophomore album, Phonetics On and On, delights in and charms by way of its deceptively childlike and unwaveringly playful language, which spins choruses out of virtually each variation of “da da da.” Having moved from Chicago to New York between albums, the trio enlisted musician/producer Cate Le Bon to pare down and declutter the sound of 2022’s Variations of Fashionable Efficiency whereas amping up the absurdity within the subtlest locations. By way of the uncanniness and restraint, although, shines bare emotionality. “It’s oh so plain to see,” Nora Cheng sings on the very finish, “How usually I feel sentimentally.” Whether or not repeating or tangling up the identical phrases, Horsegirl make you wish to sit down and hear.
1. The place’d You Go
“Far-off” is the reply to the opener’s titular query, which rolls right into a jaunty stream of “fah-la-la”s. The band members naturally sound tight-knit within the call-and-response hook, which invitations listeners into this easiest type of play. The album’s shortest tune, it presents the fundamental system of Phonetics On and On – it might even have ended across the one-minute mark, however a spiky guitar outro provides an additional sprint of enjoyable.
2. Rock Metropolis
Critics who’re fast to name Phonetics On and On a coming-of-age file ought to think about ‘Rock Metropolis’, which is a couple of shepherd who’s been watching the identical solar sinking down the identical hill for forty years. (Horsegirl’s median age is 21.) It’s a humorous manner of singing concerning the loneliness of rising previous: “Shepherd’s received 100 mates at dwelling/ He says how do you do/ However no heat of their wool.” As they flip the tempo down, you’ll be able to really feel it, too – although the last-minute switch-up will get me each time, and I’ve heard the file half a dozen instances.
3. In Twos
In interviews, the band has talked about leaning into the “awkwardness and vacancy” of three folks enjoying collectively stay, one thing they make house for on ‘In Twos’. The sound is extra downcast, the lyrics ambiguously private: “Each good factor that I discover, I discover I lose,” Penelope Lowenstein laments. They flesh out the tune with a lone violin, working by way of every repeated “And I attempt” like a knife ceaselessly sharpened.
4. 2468
Phonetics On and On isn’t a childlike album a lot as a file about remembering what it’s like being a toddler, and few songs puncture by way of the veil of reminiscence like ‘2468’. Giddy and freewheeling, the tune is pushed by the identical barely dissonant violin, which progressively turns into overpowered by the trio’s frenzied performances, Lowenstein’s bass getting thicker the extra ridiculous the repetition turns into. It’s a little bit eerie when a childhood flashback hits you just like the realest dream as an grownup, and this single indelibly captures that feeling.
5. Nicely I Know You’re Shy
The band’s deal with pop songcraft shines by way of ‘Nicely I Know You’re Shy’, which retains issues clear, as if to intensify how pure and candy the singer’s romantic intentions are. There’s a little bit of bitterness, too – “What occurred on the market, I want it was me” – and Lowenstein’s deadpan vocals do little to disguise her craving, nascent as it could be.
6. Julie
Undoubtedly much less nascent right here, the album’s emotional centerpiece. But ‘Julie’ is much less about unrequited love than it’s about capturing the sentiments that run deep no matter how that love is distributed; that endure by way of the transitions of early maturity. “We have now so many errors to make/ Errors to make with you,” Lowenstein sings poignantly. The guitars themselves interact in a form of dialogue: one regular and resolute, the opposite prefer it’s stabbing at some form of reality. And midway by way of an album chock filled with da da das, who’d suppose they may trigger such a pang.
7. Swap Over
Horsegirl dip again into unconscious territory on ‘Swap Over’, beating down the identical chorus till it would simply flip your thoughts off of no matter exercise you’re doing – if solely to make you focus on the music just a few seconds. Sarcastically however little question deliberately, that is probably the most locked-in they most likely sound on the entire file.
8. Data Content material
That is concurrently considered one of Horsegirl’s wordiest and most nonsensical songs, however it’s Lowenstein’s unfussy supply that makes the wordplay so pleasant. “I’m translating my speak to tones,” she sings, explaining the album’s distinctive linguistic logic.
9. Frontrunner
With its scrappy acoustic association – the model we hear is precisely the way it was initially written – there’s no tune on Phonetics On and On that sounds extra like a bunch singing to and for one another. Its playfulness begins and stops with the strain between anticipation and endurance; the remainder is pure devotion. Lowenstein and Nora Cheng stay collectively, and ‘Frontrunner’ got here collectively on the finish of a horrible day for Lowenstein. “Within the morning if you’re sleeping/ I can wait,” it resolves. There’s all the time tomorrow.
10. Sport Meets Sound
The band tries some new issues with melody and rhythm, which is compelling, even when the experimentation considerably distracts from the core of the tune. Trimming it off would give the file a extra appropriately concise runtime, although the outro gathers fairly a little bit of momentum.
11. I Can’t Stand to See You
The album closes off with a mellow, inviting pop tune that rapidly opens itself as much as the viewers: “Do you wish to go dwelling now?” Chen sings. “The night time’s virtually by way of/ Let’s sit on the ground now/ And speak, me and also you.” (It’s sufficient to make you rethink the which means of ‘I Can’t Stand to See You’ – see what they did there?) Her thoughts wanders and might’t appear to shake off the identical previous tune she heard on the radio. Among the songs on Phonetics On and On may sound such as you’ve heard them on the radio earlier than, too, possibly even in a distinct decade. However they sparkle like new, time and time once more.
