Album Review: Julia Jacklin - Crushing

The combo of both vulnerability and powerfulness in Julia Jacklin’s Crushing is what makes this record stand out. It will have you singing, swaying and surrendering to the stories and sounds which are perfected with fierce lyricism and faultlessly arranged instrumentals. There are powerful messages throughout the ten tracks that might just make you re-evaluate things or moments in your life. It’s that good.

We had a taster of what was to come from Jacklin when she released her singles Body and Head Alone last year – a voice to die for and courageous lines such as "I don’t want to be touched all the time/I raised my body up to be mine." The two opening tracks being those familiar singles, we thought, "It can’t get better than this, right?" Oh boy, were we wrong. 

"What do I do now?/There’s nothing left to find" and "I want your mother/To stay friends with mine" on Don’t Know How To Keep Loving You is one example of Jacklin’s intense poetic portrayals. It’s those momentous lines in a deeply painful articulation of falling out of love that makes it both haunting and brilliant.

When The Family Flies In tells a devastating tale of loss that is all the more poignant with the choice to back it up with keys instead of her usual strings. Alongside the piano, you can hear every eerie breath Jacklin makes throughout. Ending with one last evocative line, a simple "Well, goodbye," it’s evident how intimate and truly exposed Jacklin is willing to be on this record.

Other highlights are Good Guy, which sees Jacklin sing of the desperation that comes from loneliness, perfectly aligned with broody guitar tones and poppy drum beats. "Tell me I’m the love of your life/Just for one night," she pleads slowly.  

The strings then get a little funkier in You Were Right, where a livelier Jacklin comes out, providing us with yet another intriguing and personal anecdote. One of our favourite lines on the record has to be, "I started eating at your favourite place the night I stopped eating with you/You were always trying to force my taste, but now I’m eating there 'cause I want to/You were right, I liked it." It’s a refreshing piece of sass before we get right back into the familiar, heavy-hearted tone.

"You can’t be the one to hold him, when you were the one who left," Jacklin tells herself in Comfort. The feelings that come rushing to you after a break-up, the need to comfort that very someone that you’ve left broken-hearted – Jacklin seems to have been there, because she has articulated those thoughts boldly and brilliantly. Backed by just her guitar, Jacklin turns the song into something whimsical and miserable.

They are such universally felt tales, portrayed in an extraordinary way, that you’re left haunted and amazed by the record's ability to feel so intimate yet so relatable. It’s near impossible not to get 100% engrossed in Crushing, which is a wildly appropriate title given it’s going to crush you – in a way any remarkable record should.