Cowards - Squid: Review
Review by Lavender:
Squid are a UK post-punk outfit who debuted earlier this decade alongside contemporaries Black Country New Road, Black Midi and Shame in a movement dubbed by some (and I hate this term for the record) as "post-Brexit core." Despite that awful title the music has been astoundingly good and the band's often get off to a quick start. Squid was included in that as I loved and still really love their 2021 debut album Bright Green Field. Even though their 2023 follow-up was a slightly sophomore slump, there was still plenty I liked about the album and combined with some solid singles I was looking forward to Cowards a lot.
Two of those singles come right at the start of the record and it's a great way to begin. "Crispy Skin" was the first and still my favorite of the bunch feeling like a throwback to the vibes of some of the wandering compositions and oddball vocalizations of the band's first record. "Building 650" is more straightforward in its presentation but it manages to serve up several interesting momentum shifts and even more catchy refrains.
My favorite deep cut on the album "Showtime!" also feels like it erupts out of Bright Green Field. The song announces its intention to flat-out fucking rock right away with propulsive drums and pounding guitar riffs alongside snarled-out refrains. Around the midpoint though, it has a glitchy breakdown that doesn't really feel like anything the band has done before. It's one of the best songs on the record and has me locked in every time. I also love "Blood On The Boulders" which helps punctuate a killer start to the album. The softly spoken lyrics about poorly built houses and brain-frying drugs it builds with eventually grow in intensity and the rush that follows is enthralling, even if it's a bit predictable. By the time it works it's way down to an isolated whisper at the end the entire journey of the song feels earned and executed perfectly.
The midpoint of the album features a pair of songs in "Fieldworks I & II" that represent the first pretty striking new digression from the band so far with straying string sections dominating the first half. From there it gets drearier and more intense in tone. I wasn't crazy about the journey it goes on at first but I'd be lying if I said the eerie and dramatic moments haven't grown on me. What hasn't grown on me is the third single "Cro-Magnon Man" which is definitely a shift from the other two. While it maintains an anxiety-inducing instrumental the layered vocals are much sillier almost channeling a band like Viagra Boys and I'm not just saying that because the lyrics are about a cro-magnon man. I don't exactly find it's tongue-in-cheek demeanor very charming and the plinky chorus is sort of the final nail in the coffin for me.
Thankfully the record does pick up again. "Cowards" is definitely the album's lyrical highlight despite how imprecise it is. All the evocative imagery bouncing between feeling trapped in the world and yet endlessly fascinated by it is just fascinating. The eruption it eventually reaches is relatively modest by Squid standards yet it feels like the perfect addition alongside the horn line to drill the song's points home. Finally there's the 8-minute closer "Well Met" which feels as much like a medley of some of the album's ideas both new and old as it does a standalone song. From the whispered background vocals to the variety of baroque instrumentation and even some of the glitchy production it sort of feels like having the record recapped across a single song. I'm not crazy about the track itself but it does eventually land on a great ending for the entire record with the circular strings and ever-approaching drums that boom away.
I think it's safe to consider Cowards a bounce-back record for Squid. Despite a bit of a lull during the middle of the record the album does a much more important job of reminding me why the band is so unique and interesting in the first place. From the grit and intensity of the vocal performances throughout both at their loudest and quietest to the creative and expansive compositions that make so many of these songs feel like self-contained epics, there's as much to like here as ever. Squid once again prove why they belong on the pedestal every bit as much as any of their new school post-punk contemporaries. 7.5/10
