At the start of her album debut, Melanie Baker does primal scream therapy. Must be. Because sometimes you just feel “AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!” Unfortunately, problems can’t just be shouted away. And the songwriter from Newcastle has a lot of problems in her bag. Already on their 2024 EP “Burnout Baby” the songs were called “This Won’t Be Pretty” and “All My Plants Have Died”.
On the single “Sad Clown,” Baker sings to the apathetic, strumming electric guitar about tomatoes he planted himself and never harvested and about nosebleeds on the bus. Without using soft focus, she paints the picture of a depressive episode that hides itself poorly behind a cool facade. And she pulls herself to a fighting mantra: “I don’t want to feel like this!” The electric guitars roar along. If you were looking for the ultimate mental health anthem, “Sad Clown” would be a worthy candidate.
Simple and effective
The mix of despair, anger and dry humor, the transformation of mental low points and the accompanying everyday chaos into rousing energy runs through SOME BODY HELP ME, I’M BEING SPONTANEOUS. In “My Head Fell Off Last Night”, Baker finds original metaphors for her psychological state with the casual slacker rock attitude of Courtney Barnett and mixes them with painfully authentic reality bites as the song boils up into a wild fuzz-fest. “Slugs” also undergoes a metamorphosis: from acoustic ballad to noisy catharsis.
This brings back memories of the – now separated – southern English colleagues from Porridge Radio, whose third album appeared in exactly this place in the magazine four years ago. In a duet with Porridge Radio singer Dana Margolin, known for her fearlessness and intensity, Baker could very well scream herself into a rage.
Melanie Baker knows what she’s singing about
Sounds pretty depressing somehow? It’s not. Like many 90s-inspired indie rockers of today, Baker loads her grungy sound with plenty of (power) pop. And with queer empowerment. In “HAHA!” Baker laughs from her bed – not without self-doubt – in the face of those who want to bend her. “I’ve found so much freedom and liberation by allowing myself to be silly and have fun again, even though I live in a world that still doesn’t want to accept queer joy,” she comments on the song’s motif.
In “Real Life,” she plunges into real life (or is it fantasy?) with a childlike joy, fueled by an electrifying siren riff that could have come from a 1994 Elastica hit. However, it’s not just effervescent catchy tunes that she succeeds in: the campfire-ready “Bye Bye, Loser Blues” is a lethargic, but hitting the mark, swan song to the constraints of the capitalist world of work: “When are we gonna walk out that door? / Don’t look back / All the money’s on the floor.” The final message is clear: “You’ll Get Better.” It’s a minute and a half message of courage to the hopeless and exhausted out there. Simple and effective. Because we have learned: Melanie Baker knows what she is singing about.
