In the years following the release of their first album, Goat Girl have grown a lot: from young budding experimenters who made their debut with an album with mysterious and fascinating sounds, with lyrics produced during adolescence that incorporated public and private themes, they have evolved towards deeper and more mature territories. In the three years that divide Goat Girl from On All Fours, the band has faced personal battles, experimented with instruments, engaged in various forms of activism, went through the isolation of the pandemic: in this second album is evident the individual growth of each member of the group, who through music and words explore environments both inside and outside of themselves. The lyrics of On All Fours speak of subjective experiences, environment and climatic catastrophes, mental health, politics, the society in which we live; musically, it continues in the wake of the humid and bizarre sounds of the first album, but this time there’s more confidence, more density, the voices overlap and intertwine in enchanted spirals, the microphone is passed between one song and another.
The new ease is already evident from the first track, Pest, which begins crawling slowly and then explodes in the second part, making us understand from the beginning that the Goats have no intention of lower their guard; Badibaba has a cheerful and playful chorus that reminds us of a world of masks and nursery rhymes, while Once Again splits between a fast-paced, rolling rhythm and a sleepy reggae. In P.T.S. Tea Rosy Bones tells a personal, unpleasant incident with a dumb man, taken as an example of the harassment suffered because of people inappropriately curious about their gender identity, sometimes touching on aggression:
There’s something in your eyes
They’re looking for the prize, that’s not me
Don’t look thеre now
Don’t burn me later
The emotional peak of the record is reached with Sad Cowboy – the first single from the album -, a track that charms and fills with melancholy from the very first listen. The synthesizers envelop and drag us into a vibrantly coloured world like the one pictured on the cover, with Lottie Cream performing what is perhaps one of her best vocal performances ever: her warm and delicate voice, at times monotonous in a fascinating way, whispers lyrics that speak of disillusionment and loss of contact with reality, a feeling that we have all had abundant experience and that, perhaps for this reason, hits straight to the heart with particular intensity, leaving an indelible mark. The theme of the environment, more current and urgent than ever, is the protagonist of The Crack, which illustrates a dystopian future in which humans move en masse to another planet after making the Earth completely uninhabitable.
Mental health becomes the cornerstone of the next two songs, Closing In and Anxiety Feels, sung respectively by Lottie and Ellie Rose “L.E.D.” Davies: in the first one, Lottie describes anxiety as a ghost that slipped through my bones, enters and controls everything, both body and mind; in the second one, Ellie reflects on the pros and cons of anxiolytics: on the one hand she would like to take them, on the other she’s afraid of anesthetising and becoming numb, but the sense of confusion and helplessness always remains:
Please don’t leave me alone
Staring out the window
I know I should get out the house
Make myself useful
Follow the syncopated rhythm of They Bite On You, the engaging pop of Bang and then Where Do We Go From Here?, a detailed description of Boris Johnson’s ideal dissection, which materialises and brings to the surface all the rottenness that lies within each tory; finally, the album ends with the elegant A-Men (which for the second time sees Rosy on vocals), full of crystalline ringings and guitar solos reminiscent of the evanescent oriental melodies.
On All Fours is the product of a band that has grown from all points of view, first and foremost the musical and the human one. Goat Girl have clear ideas, they have matured and know what they want to talk about and how to transform their thoughts into sounds capable of painting fantastic landscapes: despite the various obstacles that have shown along the way, they haven’t let themselves be discouraged and have made a second album (generally considered the most difficult) which is a little gem, full of integrity and sensitivity; an accurate snapshot of our time and the difficulties we’re all going through as youngsters, women, queer – with particular attention to the situation in the UK -, but also a small time capsule full of hope and wisdom for those to come after us.
DISCORDANCE 