Stella Donnelly – Beware of the Dogs
Following Stella Donnelly’s 2017 debut EP, Thrush Metal, comes her highly-anticipated first long-player, which further enhances her reputation as the teller of observant, honest and witty stories with a stunning voice that’ll stop you dead in your tracks.
Opener, Old Man, immediately announces that the Western-Australian is not here to take any of your shit, thank you very much. “Your personality traits don’t count if your dick’s in someone’s face,” she spits on the track which was born out of Woody Allen calling the #metoo movement a witch-hunt. “Are you scared of me old man, or are you scared of what I’ll do? You grabbed me with an open hand, the world is grabbing back at you.”
The song sets the tone for the album, in that Donnelly tells it like it is, and does so by delivering razor-sharp lyrics with her stunning, nuanced, soulful vocal sitting atop delicious musicianship. When the take-downs arrive, they are – like all good punchlines – perfectly placed and savage. On Seasons Greetings she declares about a unnamed antagonist, “My mum’s still a punk and you’re still shit.” Pleasingly, the song ends a with fade-out which floats various “fuck offs” through your speakers, culminating with a final, “Ok… good… fuck off”. Glorious.
Moments of acerbic vengeance are juxtaposed with tenderness and vulnerability, such as on Allergies, in which she laments. “I did my best to love you / I did my best to stay,” Meanwhile, Tricks lands close to mid-90s UK indie, a la Echobelly or Sleeper, only with added Kyle & Jackie O and Southern Cross tattoo references. Later, U Owe Me takes a swipe at a shitty former boss. “You’re jerking off to the CCTV while I’m pouring plastic pints of flat VB.”
This website’s song of the year for 2017, Boys will Be Boys, which originally appeared on Thrush Metal, absolutely belongs at the heart of this new album. Indeed, there is no better illustration of the power of Stella Donnelly’s voice and the importance of her words. Counterbalancing the humour displayed throughout Beware of the Dogs, the utterly heartbreaking Boys Will Be Boys soberly and frankly talks of society’s tendency to blame the victims of sexual assault and rape and make excuses for the perpetrators.
Elsewhere, Lunch intricately explores the feeling of displacement upon returning from tour, while the album’s title track takes a swipe at the “pious fucks” running your country.
There is a lovely sense of familiarity to the songs on Beware of the Dogs. Maybe it’s because Stella has already been performing some of them on stages around the world, or perhaps, more likely, it’s simply because they are excellently-observed, everyday tales to which anyone with a heart and a soul will surely relate. Sure, these are Stella’s stories, but they feel like yours and mine too.
Bitingly witty and beautifully truthful, Beware of the Dogs is a triumph of a debut album. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll buy yourself a copy of this record and play it to fucking death.
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Beware of the Dogs is out March 8th. Pre order it here.
Review by Bobby Townsend.
