Tomorrow’s Fire, the new album from Chicago artist Squirrel Flower is a potent record with self-effacing folk songwriting backed by a loud shoegaze-tinged band. This is their third album for Polyvinyl, and their most varied yet, equally full of loud, head-banging moments, and intricate, transcendent vocal arrangements.
Like most years that join the rear-view mirror, 2022 develops its hazy complexion. As it does, brilliant highlights cut through the fog. One of those lights is Squirrel Flower's latest record Planet EP. The self-produced effort, released last January, earmarks a chapter in the artistic career of Ella Williams that is worth exploring for its clarity of emotion.
Planet (i) swiftly follows Squirrel Flower’s debut, and offers an even further improvement in voice, production, and style. The reoccurring lyrical themes, the diverse yet consistently focused sonic palette, and some of the most well written songs in the Squirrel Flower catalogue proves this to be their strongest statement to date.
In some ways, I Was Born Swimming is a perfect record for this period of isolation. Recounting intimate moments from her life (literally starting from her own birth on the titular track), Williams navigates through feelings of loneliness, anxiousness, and heartbreak with the goal of constantly moving forward.
