Known as the up and coming London band included in MTV Push’s Ones To Watch 2020 shortlist after supporting the Foals 2019 Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost World Tour in Russia and Ukraine. Sea Girls have gone from strength to strength, from selling out the London Brixton Academy to their debut LP Open Up Your Head entering the top five in the Official Album Chart.
Like their debut effort, Homesick continues to address issues of mental health as well as frontman Henry Camamile’s return to his parents’ home in Lincolnshire and Americanisms. Most importantly, Homesick confronts Camamile’s need for a sense of belonging, whether with another person, life on the road or being with his family.
Opening with “Hometown”, one is immediately enticed with a hungry, strong guitar intro. This consistently upbeat retrospective song discusses the people the frontman he got high, smoked and went to school with, and being up for anything. After all, “Nothing feels real when you’re 17”. “Hometown” leads into the self-critical and almost self-loathing “Sick”. Camamile lets himself have it from his “timing letting me down” and not having good looks. Elsewhere on “Sick”, Henry addresses the things that make him feel vacuous, including consuming and buying, where he asks for a “reset”, which he confesses is “a childish solution” and wishes he was “still a child”.
Homesick delves further into feeling insecure on “Someone’s Daughter Someone’s Son” from going to places on your own, feeling watched and anxious and that everyone else can sense this anxiety. Despite the gloomy lethargic subject matter, this song’s distorted motley of indie guitars has an elating, youthful, fiery and passionate impact on the listener irrespective of whether they connect to the lyrics. “Sleeping with You”, a mellow acoustic song with subtle rudimentary and ubiquitous synths, is about a girl the singer is no longer with. Awkward considering the girl he is current with and her drugs “are in my room”.
As in “Sick”, “Paracetamol Blues” addresses self-loathing and needing to fit in with youthful energy, which is again well summarised: “I don’t like myself, but maybe you do”. As well as mentioning the Soho Wagamama, friends of ex’s; “Paracetamol Blues” is the frontman’s attempt at trying to perk someone up whilst telling them some home truths. The topic of self-doubt continues with more stomping and feisty guitars and drumming on “Again Again”. People seeking to delve beyond this high BPM track will find much to excavate from these lyrics: “I feel bad in the morning, but I hate being boring”. These issues are also addressed on the penultimate track, “Cute Guys”, which is an Americanism, when two thirds in unexpectedly turns, from what begins as a humble acoustic song to a stadium rock anthem befitting crowd surfing and moshing.
Concerning rock guitars and guitar solos, there are few on Homesick; the best is saved for the playout track “Friends”. The philosophy on “Friends” is appalling where one is advised to “grab your friends wherever you can who’ll fuck up your plans…” nonetheless, it’s an ideal playout to an honest LP where listeners can choose what they want to get out of it. Listeners can choose to forget by focusing on dancing to the indie guitar soundtrack or delve more deeply into the lyrics. If they decide not to see how they relate to them, they will undoubtedly see how the lyrics relate to others. The ability of Sea Girls to draw fans who wish to ponder and those who wish to forget will undoubtedly see their already impressive fans base continue to grow with Homesick.
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