It’s safe to say Tor Maries (aka Billy Nomates) has been through the wringer. In between transitioning to managing herself and dealing with an onslaught of misogynistic hate and abuse from a Glastonbury performance (which eventually had to be taken down), Maries lost her father to Parkinsons. All the while, she was working on her third album, Metalhorse. Presented with all this, many would retreat and abandon work. “From the second I started working on this album, every other month has brought this massive life shift that has either been weirdly magical and brilliant, or quite the opposite,” Maries explains.
Taking inspiration from what her Dad would do, Maries soldiered on. “We’re here against the odds anyway. Let’s just carry on,” she determined. The result is a resolute and stubborn album set on charging forward, all while trying to outrun what feels like an oncoming storm. Working with the concept of a dilapidated funfair representing the tumultuousness of life, Metalhorse has the air of rusted rides creaking in the wind, abandoned stalls with absent prizes on the shelves, and a ghostly air of the lights flashing for spectators not there. The opening tracks set the scene: a wobbly carousel of piano and twanging electric guitar weave a melancholic air on “Metalhorse” while “Nothin Worth Winnin” comes complete with the sound of coins going into slot machines as murky synths ring out like a fruit machine in a pub. “I wanna play with somebody else / I got the fairground all to myself,” Maries laments.
From there Maries sets off on a perkier track. This is the first Billy Nomates album to be made in a studio and with a full band, and Maries makes sure to make the most of it: “Moon Explodes” is a widescreen final flourish, “Plans” and “The Test” are driven with a Springsteen-like briskness, and “Dark Horse Friend” even enlists The Stranglers’ Hugh Cornwell (a personal favourite of Maries’ father, who was buried in a t-shirt of the band) for a noir-ish new wave anthem. The album is motivated in tone, but unfortunately falls victim to repeating the same tricks over and over; before long the initially curious scene setting of Metalhorse gets stuck in a series middle of the road tracks that seem to say the same thing repeatedly. Every so often Maries might unleash a snarl of grieving anger, but it’s always a flash in the pan. On “Plans” she sets herself up for a tirade of frustration at the world (“They’ve got plans for us / I bet they’re really bad / I bet they’re just awful / SkyHigh, A.I., World War III,”) before declaring “Ah, fuck it” and just abandons what could have been a genuinely interesting moment of unabashed fury (despite the unpromising and bland quoted lyrics).
Letting compelling moments slip between her fingers is unfortunately a common feature on the album. “The Test” revs a motorcycle for a few seconds, edging towards what could be a gritty chainsaw-like guitar solo, but instead opts to just softly merge into the bridge. “Comedic Timing” is one of the album’s few moments of direct melancholic introspection (“Everything that I know / Isn’t keeping up with me”) but the canned laughter feels all too on the nose, while the two-minute “Life’s Unfair” feels like a prelude to a more cinematic moment that never comes. Elsewhere Maries’ phrasing sometimes works against her. At her best she’s able to wring out a wry, despondent, and striking plainness (“My best friend’s dying,” she opens with on “Nothin Worth Winnin”), but lines like “Your love is something that I just can’t get enough” and “Yeah, we all get what we give / When did all the circus get so expensive?” are clunky and could have come from anyone.
Metalhorse, like a carousel in the conceptual bedraggled funfair, spins itself in circles for its own sake. It’s honest about its origins and inspiration, but hurts itself by not seeing that it’s repeating itself as it goes on. The penultimate track “Strange Gift” stands out because it strips away much of the decoration, leaving just guitar, piano, and Maries’ soul-searching voice. Reckoning with grief head on, Maries muses over how life goes on (“Politics stay the same and thе Earth / Doesn’t really care”) but memory persists. Taken out of the funfair, Maries is at her starkest. Metalhorse would have been better if Maries left the place abandoned instead of turning on all the lights, rides, and slot machines for a crowd that aren’t there.
