by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)
When we first encountered the mystique of Squid Ink Sky back in February, we had mentioned that Goo’s “slow dripped brand of psychedelic folk and wide open expanses is void of the hustle and bustle of city life, the songs taking their time to draw upon moonlight ambiance amid whispered croons, gentle acoustics, sweeping melodies, and subtle twang.” It’s the immediate feeling you get upon digging into the New York City band’s second album, but it’s not so much void of the city’s grind as it adrift from surroundings, lost in its own thought. For every feeling of transportive escapism to environments vast and arid, rooted in both realism and fantasy, there’s a sense that Beck Zegans is pushing forward one day at a time, waking up each morning to see what life has to offer, each strange day anew. It’s a Western tale removed from the West, reflections carried from cramped apartments and crowded streets. Squid Ink Sky feels like a voyage through daydreams and personal reflections, love remembered in dim light that refuses to be forgotten, balanced with the resolve to continue forward. Written in isolation during the pandemic lock-downs, the album envisions real life in slow motion, entwined with realms outside our reality, mind in tact but everything else temporarily suspended in surreality.
The world of Squid Ink Sky lives in the moon’s glow, it fills the space at the end of the day reserved for late night sentiment. It’s the feeling of being alone with your thoughts, watching as your mind wanders from what could be to what is, and how it could have gone a million different ways between. Within the haze of scattered thoughts and blurring reality is where Goo become their most radiant. The band - Zegans (vocals, guitar), Q Robinson (bass), Leah Beck (keys, backing vocals), and Anders Johnson (drums) - never rush into anything, their pacing feels deliberately thoughtful, with nowhere to be, there’s room to drift, to let dreams evolve as they may. It’s mood music that’s far from passive, the band are creating atmosphere that finds itself somewhere between the sprawl of cosmic Americana and the smoky confines of small DIY clubs. The songs feel open, determined to make every note count, the space of the compositions designed with reverant nuance. It would feel haunting if it wasn’t so beautiful, but even heartbreak comes paired with healing. Joined by guests J.R. Bohannon (pedal steel), Sean Brennan (cello), and Julian Fader (vibraphone), the many textures of the record are drawn upon with deft subtlety, everything sounds lush yet delicate. Recorded by Zegans and Fader, mixed by Fader, and mastered by Amar Lal, each layer is deliberately woven to either disorient or restructure thought, as one reality flips to the next, Goo bring us along with grace and ease.
The brightest star in the Squid Ink Sky revolves around Beck Zegans’ immaculate voice, cool and velvety, smoky and resonant. Every word, every forlorn reflection, every resigned memory is given extra weight in her delivery, her’s words linger in the ether. Her voice gives a soulful feeling to fragmented apparitions of love, forever committed to wander. As words are stretched with gorgeous sustain and Zegans sings lullabies of loneliness, there’s an intoxicating quality to her melodies cutting through the still evening air. Goo create music from the heart that never feels overly emotional, a testament to the cool resolve in Zegans’ voice. She’s going through it, but her dreams become comfort, anything is possible when nothing is quite as it seems. It’s that idea that introduces the album on “Moongloom,” as minimalist arpeggios are picked from soft guitars, Zegans traverses beyond boredom to a place where “we see, we hear, we feel, but only fantasy is real”. It’s a set-up for the record, a theme that the songs often revolve around. That which is real is what we make it to be. Squid Ink Sky is a chance to step outside ourselves if only momentarily, to reside in this dream space as long we’re able.
Songs seem to dip in and out of our so-called reality without drawing attention to the details. Goo are happy to paint in abstract flourishes, with strokes of dusty saloon expanse (“Outlaw”) as love is drawn away, to tales of fantasy. One of the album’s many highlights, “Knight,” is awash in scenic fantasy, but it’s within that realm that Zegans makes the realization, “entwined, my dragon and my knight / forever on the other side of victory,” her supposed hero and her anguish having become one and the same. As the song progresses with twinkling keys, splashing cymbals, and a slow building urgency, each verse, every change in season, is left with a resolution and Goo’s fundamental understanding that, “we overcome and undergo.”
For the moments where things feel impossible (“Demon”), Zegans looks inward (“own your own mind, I'll give another try”) and when waking life remains all too heavy, there’s “Realm,” a song that recedes beyond this existence toward the unexplored (“there's nothing to be done, I just keep on the run”). With silky pedal steel that permeates a “country-gaze” soaked fog, the band find themselves deep in psychedelic twang, peaceful and serene yet expansive and gorgeously unanchored. We’re reminded that our thoughts can be cyclical (“Green Ray”), that reality is fleeting (“Real Life”), and that not all ideas are the best of ideas (“Other Side”), but that’s life, blurry or in perfect clarity, we live and we learn. Squid Ink Sky ultimately settles into that place of understanding so often explored, “Anywhere Alone” serves as the first hint of sun coming through the dark night, there’s a new day dawning and despite how it may sometimes feel, we’re never truly alone.
Then again, it’s entirely possible I missed the point altogether. Either way, profound and patient, Goo’s Squid Ink Sky is one of the year’s most beautiful records.