
10
Cowards
Squid
Squid’s tertiary album Cowards is a transformative masterpiece that is as expressive and instrumentally dense as it is dark and poetic, with Ollie Judges’s crawling lyrics written from the perspectives of all sorts of Terrible People. The first listen of this album is an extremely thrilling and unique experience that will leave you completely surprised yet utterly amazed by the amount of versatility the Band displays on each song. The Band cemented their position in the music industry as one of the most genre-bending Bands in the world with their first two records, Bright Green Field and O Monolith, but still managed to push the envelope even further with Cowards expanding on their sound while still managing to create songs with memorable moments and moods in every one of them.
The Opening track and lead single, Crispy Skin, is an incredibly melodic and rhythmically dense track that opens with some gorgeous synth sequences and melodies that are an immediate tone-setter for the album. The song’s compelling melodic nature and mature instrumentation Is a brilliant juxtaposition to the blood-curdling lyrics that float in and out of the track, sobering you with their disturbing nature with lines as bleak as “pages and pages of crispy skin” The song is a grandiose yet understated track that invites us into the dark and complex world of these characters The melodies and frantically expressive vocal delivery Ollie is bringing to this album are unlike any of his work prior and its showcased on crispy skin to great effect. Building 650 is a stunning track with incredibly impressive instrumentation, such as layers of gorgeous strings creeping in and out of the song without ever being too distracting from the high-energy performances from the Band.
The third track, Blood On The Borders, starts as a pretty and rhythmically enticing song that slowly builds into a chaotic and anxiety-inducing bridge section with frenetic synth and guitar stabs that fastly evolve into a very cathartic and high-energy build of intensity with frantically performed violin runs and once again another brilliant vocal performance from ollie judge that is heavily overdubbed making it oddly anthemic for a squid song. The song comes back to its moody and calming verse that opens the song and ends with Ollie delivering some very intimate vocals. The way that Blood on the Borders transitions into Fieldworks gave me goosebumps like I’ve never had before. It is an absolutely masterful track with some gorgeous harpsichord and keyboard lines followed by some very emotional and cinematic strings that overtake the track with their intensity alongside Ollie’s vocals delayed and panned very effectively. The song transitions into its second half, Fieldworks II, which may honestly be my favourite song off the whole album down to the percussion intro and the simple and emotionally derivative guitar chords to the softly sung vocals and lyrics and the absolutely crushing string section that adds so much tension and emotion to the song. The secondary guitar line that comes halfway through the track is such a brilliant and fascinating part, and it is so incredibly squid in such a new and exciting way.
Cro-Magnum Man returns to the frenetic kraut rock inspired and dissonant style of Squids songwriting that you might expect but still manages to have some of the grandiose melodic moments that are so connected within the record, for example, the four-part harmony vocal parts and poetic yet pulpy lyrics matched with the fast-paced synth arpeggios and piano lines. The title track, Cowards is one of the most impressive songs on the record and is so carefully crafted and put together. The section at 2.24 has some of the most gorgeous melodies intertwining on guitar, saxophone and keyboard, creating a wonderful cacophony of harmony and brilliant musical arrangements. This song is a fantastic showcase of Squid’s ability to make incredibly dense and emotional pieces of music that are so boundary-pushing yet still in their sonic universe and signature style, proving them to be a genuine unstoppable force of creativity. The song to back up the genius title track is another absolute monster of a track Showtime! that goes in a completely different direction than you expect with that absolutely batshit synth speed up into the ever-evolving final section of the song. The first half of this song is an absolute masterclass in technical but groovy rhythms and insane vocal phrasing. I’m really excited to see how a song like this will evolve in a live setting as it is so dense with parts and technicality. The repetitive and hypnotic synths and guitar lines in the 2nd half of this song are another moment of absolute ear candy on this album and are truly one of the biggest highlights of the record.
The grandiose finale of this album is the groundbreaking track Well Met ( Fingers Through The Fence), which is more textured and chaotically nuanced than you could ever imagine. The song is such a perfect ending to this album and has the ability to have you completely engaged until the very end with its stunning instrumentation of harpsichord, IDM-inspired synth sequences and elegantly performed layered vocals. The last couple minutes of this song contain some of the most genius instrumentation of the Band’s whole career, which may sound a bit extreme. Still, I can promise you that if you commit to a full listen of this album, you will be absolutely stunned by the attention and care the Band displayed in these nine songs, and you will not want it to end.
Pre-order Cowards by Squid HERE
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