After leaving her role as leader of post-grunge outfit
Batrider to embark on a solo career,
Sarah Mary Chadwick established an even rawer, more tormented performance style that she pairs with deeply vulnerable lyrics and typically stark accompaniment. Across her first three albums, instrumentation often consisted solely of a guitar or keyboard. She eventually brought in an outside rhythm section for 2018's
Sugar Still Melts in Rain, though the next year's
The Queen Who Stole the Sky was a solo effort featuring
Chadwick and a 19th century pipe organ. Her sixth solo album, 2019's
Please Daddy, features
Chadwick's most expansive palette yet, not only returning bassist/co-producer
Geoffrey O’Connor and drummer Tim Deane-Freeman from
Sugar Still Melts in Rain but enlisting flute and trumpet players, along with her own keyboards and vocals. It should be noted that the songs here are still distinctly stark, but adding more timbres to the mix is a headline-worthy development for
Chadwick. It coincides with a movement toward more engaging melodies and a more welcoming demeanor, in general, at least musically speaking. Her lyrics are still brutally candid and vulnerable, as evident in the resigned opening words "I'm falling apart/I suspect I'm blowing it/And I thought I was past this/But I'm losing it" on a track called "When Will Death Come." Not for the faint of heart, the lyrics lead to a more openly anguished chorus that, while melodic, howls for relief over its pounding piano chords, harmonic flute and trumpet, and drums that maintain a cabaret-friendly 6/8 time ("If you feel the same as me, I pity you now"). Only just the opener, it's followed by devastating tracks including the slow and mournful "I'm Not Allowed in Heaven," "Let's Fight," and "All Lies." For those familiar with
Chadwick's previous work, in addition to the lyrics' especially low lows, noteworthy is the album's tunefulness, especially in the case of the soaring piano pop entry "Please Daddy" and reflective "Make Hey." Though there are plenty of her trademark semi-melodic, improvised-sounding tirades as well, among the other surprises is "Let's Fight," whose brisk gallop evokes retro country-rock. As
Chadwick continues to experiment with means of expression, it seems fitting that some of her darkest lyrics inhabit a set that is arguably her most ear-pleasing to this point.