STACK #203 Sep 2021

FEATURE MUSIC

BRAVO AMADO You might have recognised the

better at it. Or if I have no energy, all I am is a pile of human in a bed. So I guess it‘s the only tangible thing we actually have. That‘s kind of the real currency, to me.“ The rest of the songs can be considered as frank expressions of how to invest that currency. Freaks To The Front is about reserving your precious energy for those who will salute your freak flag (“If they don‘t like you, just ignore the c-nt!“); Choices is about the frustration with having to spend

just before I got on [Zoom with you] now, I went for a run in the city. And I was like, ‘Yeah, this is kind of crap.‘“ The elation in the track comes through in Declan‘s guitar, one of many wild-eyed solos across the album. Here‘s where the scratch track detail comes in: Dec was playing the solo with no intention of actually using it. “The only thing you use from the scratch track is the drums and the bass,“ he explains. “The guitar and vocals just play along, so the drummer and bassist know where you are in the song. So I was just mucking around

aesthetic of Comfort To M e‘s cover art; it‘s the work of Portuguese/NYC artist Braulio Amado, who (in addition to his own work) produces a lot of material for musicians, such as tour posters for Robyn and remix cover art for Roisin Murphy. He came to the band‘s attention as a collaborator with PHC films, which created Comfort To Me ‘s high-spirited clips. “I saw [his art and] was like, ‘That‘s sick‘,“ says Amy. “The cover to me is kind of, my face and my brain and it‘s all exploded everywhere, and that‘s how I feel, and I felt like that lyrically... that‘s what [the album] sounds like to me. It‘s perfect.“

energy on navigating equality (“Does my opinion really make you that sick?“); and Knifey is the exhaustion of energy spent on personal safety (“All I ever wanted was to walk by the park, all I ever wanted was to walk by the river... Please , stop f-cking me up!“).

on that solo – I just went for it. I had a weird phaser effect on, a similar effect to what Eddie Van Halen uses. We finished and I was like, ‘Hey Dan [Luscombe, producer], were you recording that?‘“ If the lyrics and sonics

I was sprinting up and down piles of mud, going ‘Yee-ha! Yee-ha!‘

Artwork by illustrator/graphic designer Braulio Amado, for (top) Ty Segall + the Muggers, and (below) Frank Ocean.

AmyTaylor holding the band's ARIA Award for Best Rock Album, won in 2019 for their self-titled debut

Then there‘s the joyous and brilliantly-titled Hertz , about the pleasure of spending energy on the bliss of driving out of the city and into the countryside.“I went for a drive yesterday, just an hour out of the city, literally just had a look around,“ Taylor says with a huge grin of remembrance. “I had the best day of my life! I was sprinting up and down piles of mud just going, ‘Yee-ha! Yee-ha!‘“ (In his own Zoom window, Dec is smiling to himself.) “I felt so happy out there,“ Taylor continues, “I was laughing all day. I saw a full half-rainbow, and I was like, ‘If I was in the city I would only have seen a little quarter of that motherf-cker!‘ Then

somehow weren‘t enough to convey the memo, take a glance at the video for Security – a track in which Taylor laments a bouncer‘s reluctance to let her in to the pub, even though she‘s simply “looking for love“ – which is a one-shot take of Taylor dancing alone in a cemetery. It‘s kind of disarming to see someone dancing for all she‘s worth with nary a practised, TikTok-ready move in sight. “Completely spontaneous and expressive,“ Taylor agrees with glee. “No routine, no choreography. It just came out weird. Just celebrating life. And where‘s a better place to do that than where everyone‘s dead?“

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