Soak

<i>Soak</i>, the fourth studio album from indie four-piece Black Honey finds their forthright frontwoman Izzy Bee Phillips newly sober and combing through the tangles of the tumultuous two-year period that preceded the record with unflinching honesty. Set against a backdrop of cinematic, scene-setting production, <i>Soak</i> invites you into a muzzy sonic interpretation of Phillips’ experience with addiction and her clear-eyed observations from outside of that sphere of reference. “Have you ever kissed a psycho?” she quips on lead single “Psycho”, and it’s unclear whether the question is being posed to the audience, an unknown third party or Phillips herself. These ambiguous framings recur throughout <i>Soak</i>, as on the title track which rails against the projection of false confidence or “Carroll Avenue”, a sneering swipe at the voyeuristic downsides of fame set to ominous, inevitable guitar chords—exactly who is being railed against and sneered at is up for interpretation. At other times, subject and narrative are more clear. The “English boy in a bucket hat” that the distorted groove of lovelorn midtempo “Sad Sun” revolves around, for example. The scattered inner monologue that spills out on album closer, “Medication”, which builds into a cacophony of echoing harmonies, for another. For all its thematic uncertainty, <i>Soak</i> is artistically self-assured, capturing a snapshot of one of the UK’s most fascinating independent bands at the point they start to really hit their stride.