There’s a cliché that, as bands mature, they tend to drift away from something essential into experimentation. For Cambridge’s Mammoth Penguins – made up of Emma Kupa (vocals, guitars), Mark Boxall (bass, keys, vocals), and Tom Barden (drums, percussion, vocals) – their fourth album – Here – takes things way, way back. To such an extent that, though largely recorded at Norfolk’s Sickroom Studios, the band decided to make additions to the album in the simpler environment of a garden shed belonging to Tom.
It’s not surprising then, that the album blends some of the rawer elements of garage or US college rock, and smatters of math-rock, alt-country and post-punk, with the more whimsical instrumentation of British indie-pop. The lyrical approach of the latter, open-hearted and often confessional, is present throughout with narratives that appear to be drawn directly from songwriter Emma’s life. In that way, and especially given the album’s title, the whole appears to be an attempt to define where, in 2024, Here is.
The dozen songs on the album zip by, despite frequent switch-ups of pace. Structurally, the songs are mostly grouped thematically in pairs; this is most clearly demonstrated in the titles of consecutive songs ‘Old Friends’ (a lilt full of jaunty strums which has both bleeps and a full-on rock guitar solo in its middle eight and lyrics expounding on the positivity of reuniting), and ‘Lost Friends’, which is acoustic guitar led and brief (coming in at less than two minutes) but as poignant as its title suggests. Elsewhere, Emma’s lyrics discuss the relative ups and downs of being in bands – ‘Flyers’ with its bouncy bass, and ‘Blue Plaque’, with its overdriven lead guitar. She reflects on surviving the days in ‘Help Yourself’ (whose Camera Obscura style opener, blends into guitars full of whammy) and the gentler sound of ‘Success’, which opens with birdsong but still contains biting lyrics in its final chorus: “Fuck success, fuck expectation”.
There are bops, in the shape of the album’s second single ‘Everything That I Write‘, where spiky guitar flecks and power chords belie lyrical discussion of someone dedicated to a band. Similarly, ‘Nothing and Everything’ is a full-on stomper, with spectral guitar and interwoven backing vocals, while lead single and album opener ‘Species‘ discusses Emma’s relative unimportance against the “between two-hundred and two-thousand species that go extinct each year”, as a flurry of percussion explodes beneath the vocal line.
What the album really leaves you with, though, is the sense that there is an emotional core underneath the rock stylings. ‘I Know The Signs’ is alt-country (with shades of Courtney Barnett), and reflects on a relationship going south. ‘Here’ sits Emma’s yearning vocals prominently alongside acoustic guitar, with lyrics about waiting for an unknown person who will partner you in adventures. Album closer ‘A Plea for Kindness’ is the nearest to an outright political statement, as its title suggests. Its opening lines “I don’t care what’s in your pants, I care what comes out of your mouth” begin against a downbeat bass, but as the song progresses, with the same lyrics repeated throughout, it turns musically into a garage stramash, clocking in at five minutes ten. Directed at the completely ill-founded and unnecessary hatred and prejudice that transphobic people insist on sharing, it offers a heartfelt message of solidarity with our trans and gender non-conforming siblings. A fitting summary of the album that has preceded it.
For Mammoth Penguins then, Here is where you were, where you are, and where you’ll be, with someone new but thinking about those that have gone; not getting what you want, but striving for more anyway. And, in another year of social and political upheaval, what better directions could there be?
Here, the new album from Mammoth Penguins, is out now via Fika Recordings. Find it on bandcamp.
John McGovern
@etinsuburbiaego
Photo Credit: Gavin Singleton
