by Elena Brand
(Personal favourites marked with an asterisk*)
Biffy Clyro is back! The Scottish trio released their ninth studio album The Myth of Happily ever After on October 22nd. Vocalist and guitarist Simon Neil describes it as a reaction to their 2020 release A Celebration of Endings: ‘This album is a real journey, a collision of every thought and emotion we’ve had over the past eighteen months.’
The album opens with ‘DumDum’ - a calm and slow tune that claims that everything is fine. The song has a powerful melodic and lyrical progression that turns the notion of ‘Everything's great, It's all been a pleasure’ from the initial verse to ‘Everything's fake, They're all under pressure’ in the second verse.
Translating the idea of doing your best but still not doing well, 'Haru Urara' transforms into a powerful message where the band chants ‘We rise, We will rise, We are the light that you need’.
This sense of struggle and hopelessness is carried through the first songs of the album with tracks such as ‘A Hunger in your Haunt’,* ‘Denier’, ‘Separate Missions’, ‘Witch’s Cup’,* ‘Holy Water’* and ‘Errors in the History of God’. These songs are a mixed bag of emotion-packed lyrics and experimental melodies that allow new listeners and long-time fans alike to feel understood in a time of confusion and frustration.
This indulgence in melancholy is shaken around the half-way mark of the album. Named after a Japanese racehorse, which is known for placing last at races, ‘Haru Urara’* starts out with calm indie and lo-fi vibes. Translating the idea of doing your best but still not doing well, this song transforms into a powerful message where the band chants ‘We rise, We will rise, We are the light that you need’, which seems to be the theme of all remaining songs on the album. This idea is finalised in the closing track ‘Slurpy Slurpy Sleep Sleep’, which is about leaving things in the past, learning from them and moving on to go through life with love in your heart.
