by Caroline Nieto (@caroline.nieto)
Lily Seabird’s sophomore album Alas, is an explosion of feelings. The follow up to 2021’s Beside Myself, Alas, is an indie rock powerhouse where every track feels like a personal catharsis for Seabird. The songs dance between folk ballads and sulky rock—you never know when a crunchy guitar will hit you halfway through a song, but there is also a refreshing plainness to Alas, an Americana sound that comes in through Seabird’s voice. As a vocalist, she evokes the whiny twang of Wednesday’s Karly Hartzman and Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker; there is a strength to her sound that surfaces between softer melodies, making clear exactly what the song means through her voice alone. The first track, “Take It,” launches that vocal superpower, as Seabird sings, “I love the world, but maybe I wasn’t meant to be happy.” This lyric, while a knife to the heart, reverberates throughout the entire album—each song shows an appreciation for the beauty of life, but a discordance with the struggle it brings.
Alas, interrogates the self, the body, and the earth with fluidity. Where “Take It” delves into the loss of selfhood in the midst of tragedy, the album’s second song, “Grace,” looks back on teenage longing. A bright, easy folk rock song with a melody you can hum to, “Grace” might be the quintessential Lily Seabird song. It has everything she does best: her signature whine, a piano lead, distorted guitar, and a vivid story. In “Grace,” Seabird thinks back to being sixteen and meeting an older girl she looked up to. The song puts memory at the forefront, leading the way for the third track, “Twenty,” to delve fully into retrospection. Musically, “Twenty” sounds like a slow summer night, with lyrics that capture the yearning of a fading adolescence. She remarks at the passing of time, singing, “Well everyday’s the same, but every day it changes. Like a river it can’t be saved.”
Seabird further gives in to the weight of loss in “Over and Over Again (Searching For You In the Space),” a lazy almost waltz that begins with, “You came to me like a morning dove, and you were gone like a bird in winter.” This metaphor, the first in a song that abounds with them, establishes the kind of writer Lily Seabird is. Her lyrics, while uncomplicated, are elegiac. “Over and Over Again” depicts the loss of a loved one through the ways their presence is still felt. Seabird feels this absence through changes she finds in herself, singing, “You changed the shape of my heart and the smell of my hair, gave shape to the ground that I walked on.” The song is unabashedly tender—Seabird’s lyricism soars when she writes about love.
Although “Over and Over Again” doesn’t specifically imply a romantic relationship, the song “Cavity” does, interrogating how intimacy can trigger self destruction. The song’s simple orchestrations are paired with words that pierce through the softness. Between metaphors are brazen lyrics like “I’m in love with you, baby, but I don’t want you around”. Saxophone and piano floats in the background somewhat uncomfortably, keeping the track from feeling like a typical love song. This dichotomy is the yin-yang that can be expected from each song on the album—the gentle songs are laden with angst, and the heavy ones leave a lingering sweetness. Every feeling is intentional, and though uplifting songs are less common on the record, there is always a shred of hope. Just take a look at the album art—within the darkness that shrouds her image, Seabird reaches up into the light.