Music Critic Archie Marks reviews Lucy Dacus’ fourth album, a slight but sweet ode to love
After three albums chronicling heartbreak and disappointment, Lucy Dacus is in love. The starry-eyed kind of love that feels exciting as much as it does calming. It’s all over her fourth album Forever Is A Feeling, a record largely populated by love songs and memories and set to twinkly instrumentals that bridge the gap between folk, indie, and rock. Unlike Dacus’ previous albums, which had the tendency to smack you in the face with revelations, her new effort works its way into your system more slowly, its gifts becoming more generous upon repeated listens.
‘Best Guess’, whose video assembles – per Dacus’ request – a small army of ‘hot mascs’, is one such example, its deceptively plain lyrics sketching a plan for the future with her lover. Later in the record, ‘Most Wanted Man’ is an essay of a love song, with Dacus declaring she could “write a book” on her girlfriend. Said girlfriend, songwriter Julien Baker, makes a backing vocal appearance on the song too, in a touching moment of autobiography.
“Though that quality makes the album less compelling than Dacus’ prior work, it’s still a delightful listen
Even the songs about love lost have a more optimistic outlook than Dacus’ previous work. The road trip-ready ‘Bullseye’, which has her vocals intertwining with Hozier’s like ribbons on a maypole, finds her amicably separating with a well-meaning partner. Meanwhile on ‘Big Deal’, she makes peace with a love that simply won’t be possible. These are songs that exhibit a quiet maturity, and though that quality makes the album less compelling than Dacus’ prior work, it’s still a delightful listen.
Dacus is at her best when dealing with intensity; on 2018’s Historian, songs like ‘Timefighter’ and ‘Night Shift’ boiled over with existential rage and had massive arrangements to match. It’s somewhat of a shame, then, that Forever Is A Feeling is a bit more reserved with its sound. ‘Modigliani’, for instance, is an impassioned paean for Dacus’ friend & fellow songwriter, Phoebe Bridgers, but the instrumental takes more of a slouched approach, dulling its impact.
“It’s somewhat of a shame, then, that Forever Is A Feeling is a bit more reserved with its sound
The record’s two best songs operate at either end of Dacus’ sonic spectrum. The seismic single ‘Talk’ is as menacing as the ex Dacus sings of, their “body looming like a spectre / Hungry as a scythe”. As it erupts in the chorus, with Dacus wailing atop a cacophony of drums, you almost wish the record had more of these sonically climactic moments. Then again, ‘For Keeps’ – a spare guitar ballad – proves that Dacus’ true gift is her pen. “If the Devil’s in the details / Then God is in the gap in your teeth,” she lilts, lamenting a relationship that’s addictive but ultimately doomed. The lullaby feel of ‘For Keeps’ works within the tenderness of the lyrics, but the same can’t be said for a few of the record’s other songs, which amble sweetly along but don’t dazzle as often as they perhaps should.
What Forever Is A Feeling lacks in punchiness, it mostly makes up for with thoughtful, measured writing, and a gentle sense of joy. For the first time, Dacus seems content and secure in her relationship – and that, in its own way, is a feeling to write home about.
7/10
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