Porridge Radio
Clouds in the Sky They Will Always Be There for Me
SECRETLY CANADIAN
Four albums in and Porridge Radio is still seeping into new indie rock corners as the band’s lit-fuse rage meets the fuel of songwriter Dana Margolin’s ranging poeticism and despondent vocals. Clouds in the Sky They Will Be There for Me feels like a breakthrough even after the Brighton band’s cathartic Waterslide, Diving Board, Ladder to the Sky LP in 2022. Clouds in the Sky is more of a shimmering stunlock of an album as Margolin’s inward lyrics pursue a reclaiming of self in the wake of a bad breakup and months of touring and promoting that last album. It possesses fewer of the serrated post-punk edges heard on 2020’s Every Bad, though the raucous core of the band is still retained in the production by Big Thief engineer Dom Monks, who recorded the LP live.
Porridge Radio drifts further away from the distinct style of their breakout 2020 album, and the variety that takes its place helps overall. Acoustic guitars, softer drumming, and even a Wurlitzer on “Lavender, Raspberries” add to the dark poeticism of the release. The lyrics this time consciously started as poetry, since Margolin wanted to improve in that area, and she brings a little more sophistication to her world-weary storytelling, which is largely inspired here by her vivid dreams. On “God of Everything Else” she sings back to what seems to be a former lover: “You always said that I’m too intense / It’s not that I’m too much / You just don’t have the guts.” Whereas people have abandoned her in the past, the birds, clouds, paintings, and other ephemera Margolin meets in her dreams will always be there for her.
Elsewhere, “Anybody,” “Sleeptalker,” and “A Hole in the Ground” all range in tone, but the record’s unconscious themes thread through them. The latter in particular sounds like a liminal space between reality and dreams as the lyrics try to kick away from Margolin’s grip on the past. She sings with an ache, “Take off all of my clothes and run to your house / Where in place of a door is a hole in the ground / And I fill it with salt, the hard bits of my heart / They fall into the hole and they tear it apart.” The rest of the band lock in with Margolin’s vision by supplying keyboard color, haunting backing vocals, and percussion and bass that range from rock blasts to lounge grooves. The big closing track “Sick of the Blues” typifies the style of most of the songs on Clouds in the Sky as the bombastic number sees Margolin jettison an old relationship and focus on wrestling back control of her life.
Porridge Radio has always been a bit of a mood piece, so mileage may vary for some listeners. On Clouds in the Sky They Will Be There for Me, the band continues to mature their sound with an active degree of precision and emotional storytelling.
