Cowards – Squid –

A tale as old as time; balance, harmony, contrast, togetherness, yin and yang, dark and light, evil and good. Two opposing forces met as a joint whole, one sucking at the teat of the other so to remain floating atop life’s sea. Without one, the other dies.

 Juxtaposition is at the heart of Brighton Post-punk Princes turned synthetic experimental rockers, Squid’s February 2025 release Cowards. Characterised by cascading dynamics, calculated builds and releases of tension, and a cerebral edge both sonically and lyrically, Cowards is a far-cry from the band’s high-octane, eccentric, danceable and scream-alongable post-punk delivered in such bygone releases as 2021’s Bright Green Field and 2019’s Town Centre EP. Tight, infectious grooves and fire-engine decibel drum and guitar explosions are usurped by microscopically considered synthesiser inflictions, icicle cold guitar tones and subtly driving low-end swells. All this adorned by certainly the darkest series of sick, twisted and evil caricatures the group has lyrically conjured. 

None such a telling exemplar as the album’s opener and lead single, Crispy Skin. Drawing inspiration from Agustina Bazterrica’s novel Tender is the Flesh, the track depicts a banal dystopia where the harvesting and killing of humans is treated with the mundanity of flicking through one’s old book collection. Underpinned by a steadily held, gradually building sonic landscape where warm bass, icy synth lines and sparkling acoustic melodies collide, Crispy Skin entices the longest standing fans of the band while introducing a new dynamic direction not yet explored so intricately by the group. 

Inspired by the group’s touring trip to Japan in 2022 (according to drummer and lead vocalist, Ollie Judge), Building 650 imposes itself immediately with a swaggering bravado via its sludgy bass groove and ear-catching, string-assisted guitar hook; liken to such Squid back-catalogue classics and Boy Racers and Match Bet. This bold energy compliments the song’s lead subject “Frank’s my friend”, and his power-driven, sociopathic tendency towards arson. A distinctly American name paired with a “No true American” sense of nationalism and string motifs liken to the Star Spangled Banner, reveal a poignant critique of evil imperialist attitudes and its destructive power over foreign lands. 

Blood on the Boulders slows the album’s pace to a near halt. The record’s quietest moments lie on this track where the group’s new direction unsheathes and takes shape. An intimate vocal performance from Judge muses our fetishistic obsession with publicised and televised violence and its permanence, framing the phenomenon as foundational to modern society, “All the houses in this country are built like shit”. Echoing this chaotic subject matter, inspired by the infamous Manson Family Killings, the track caves into a cutting frenzy of distorted guitars and chanted yells a la 90s experimental outfit Slint, as if penetrating the mind’s deepest, darkest corners. 

Taken together, Fieldworks I and Fieldworks II feel like the album’s centrepiece, located smack in the middle of the nine presented tracks and, thematically, encapsulating evil’s multifaceted nature. The tracks seem to detail a man’s descent into evil and its subsequent parasitic absorption of his being; “I fell into it”, “I forgot what it’s like/ At the bottom of the hill”. Evoking Cormac McCarthy’s own novel-manifesto on the degradation of the soul via evil, Blood Meridian, and its infamous villain, Judge Holden, Fieldworks II displays images of crying bandits condemned by the song’s narrator. A sort of hierarchy of evil is suggested here, where the more purely evil and callused individuals outclass the cowardly and petty “bandits”. Once again, these prevailing dark themes are juxtaposed with an instrumental palette lush and colourful. On the former track, sampled harpsichord lines liken to brighter Black Country New Road moments and, in the latter, swung guitar riffs playing off verdant orchestration, combine to deliver a challenging and uncanny moment of confrontation to listeners. 

Emerging from this, Cro-Magnon Man reintroduces a heavier sludgy groove, topped with bitey and glitchy electronic sounds and a chorused falsetto hook. Perhaps the record’s most lyrically cryptic moment, the track deals with parallels between archaic and modern humans, indicating an evolutionary through-line between the two, “I’ll frame my life in the bones that I have left”. Squid’s bassman and occasional trumpeter, Laurie Nankiville, in an Apple Music interview, describes the track as “a story of a pathetic self…” also referencing the psychological concept of caves as representative of the mind, illuminating the more disjointed and dream-like lyrical passages throughout the song’s runtime. Simply in terms of its tunefulness, Cro-Magnon Man is certainly one of the strong points of Cowards; the folky, childlike hook flowing from the end of the track through to the immediate memory of listeners. 

Entering the album’s final final leg, Cowards’ title track offers a melancholic atmosphere, underpinned by windy synthesisers before breaking into bright guitar lines complimentary to earlier tracks like Fieldworks I and II. The song seems to yearn for release; acknowledging the potential for an undoing of apathy, evil and entrapment, “Don’t ever say you’re bored ‘cause there’s always something more”. Judge has spoken on the track’s uniqueness relative to the band’s broader catalogue as well as its influence drawn from the idea of Stockholm syndrome, reinforcing its commentary on banality and apathy. 

The penultimate track, Showtime! abides by the now established law of Squid LPs; a jolting surge of energy injected at the third quarter of the run time, a la Peel St. off Bright Green Field and Green Light off 2023’s O Monolith. Punchy drum and bass grooves along with janky overdriven guitars pull the listener through the record’s final character piece, inspired by pop-art’s controversial poster boy, Andy Warhol. Squid’s depiction here is far from favourable, painting a maniacal and perverse artist, drunk on control and status, “And my lens / And my eyes / They follow you down to the factory”. Intense tempo increases throughout the song’s midsection channel the blood-rush of power, our somatic reaction to this most alluring facet of evil.

Wrapping up the LP, Well Met (Fingers Through The Fence) acts as a brilliant thematic and sonic summary, incorporating dramatic musical builds, warm bass contrasted with cold guitars, glitchy synth inflictions all bedding a poignant musing on apathy towards climate change and the imposition of technology. Guitarist Anton Pearson illuminates the song’s inspiration drawn from the “relationship with the countryside”, namely the town of Dunwich that the band members love so much, and its imminent deterioration, “The church in the town, is it crumbling down?”. The lengthened instrumental build which takes place over much of the song’s 8 minute runtime echoes the slow, pervasive erosion of the planet, simultaneously conveying evil’s underlying, banal omnipresence throughout our modern world. Despite this, however, Well Met is also perhaps the album’s most optimistic moment insofar as it urges listeners to face this evil within themselves, challenging our “from the backseat” apathetic attitudes. Evil is no longer manifested as discrete characters, places or concepts, it’s everywhere. Within, without, in the past, present and future, everything and nothing, ultimately always juxtaposed against its own unique facets. So what are we going to do about it?

I cannot in good faith suggest that Cowards will be a captivating or appealing listen to all fans of Squid’s more high energy work, or fans of post-punk and alternative rock in general, but what it lacks in instant memorability, punchy hooks and thrashing performances, it makes up for in its re-listenability, sensitive sonic detail and coherence as an overall piece. Deeply considered and constructed, Cowards offers spades of cerebral and aural candy, rewarding close listeners without ostracising loyal or potentially new fans. Truly worth your time, and one of the clear highlights of the month.

90/100

Alex Collins