M(h)aol, 'Something Soft' Album Review

Scream Into the Void With M(h)aol on Something Soft

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The last time I saw Irish post-punks M(h)aol play, the room was so packed that people were practically standing on top of each other. It was April of 2023, only a couple of months after the band released their excellent debut record Attachment Styles via TULLE (later re-released on Merge Records), which tackled everything from biphobia to period sex to the importance of having a family dog. One of the most predominant themes, however, was that of gender-based violence—a topic that is unfortunately always relevant, but particularly in Ireland at the time. The year before, Ashling Murphy was murdered by a stranger while out for a walk in County Offaly, and just across the Irish Sea, Sarah Everard had been kidnapped, raped, and murdered by an off-duty cop in 2021. Songs like “Asking For It”—about the aftermath of a sexual assault—and “Laundries”—which delves into the history of Ireland’s horrifically abusive Magdalen Laundries—provided much-needed catharsis for the throngs of people squeezed into Dublin’s Workman’s Club. The audience were seeking a release and a sense of forged-in-fire camaraderie that only M(h)aol could provide.

The band’s second album, Something Soft, stays focused on feminism, albeit with a more textured, urgent sound than before, and allowing for thematic detours. Part of M(h)aol’s sonic evolution comes from the slight change to the line-up; frontperson Róisín Nic Ghearailt and Zoë Greenway left the group after Attachment Styles (though Greenway has composition credits on their sophomore album). Drummer Constance Keane (also known for her electronic project Fears and label TULLE Collective) provides the main vocals these days, and her wry delivery fits in seamlessly with M(h)aol’s characteristically surging noise. She seems devil-may-care one moment—though not out of apathy, but exhaustion with the patriarchy’s dull ubiquity—before screaming with abandon through the next, exorcising every ounce of emotion through the power of her voice. The trio is completed by Jamie Hyland (who produced both this album and the last) and Sean Nolan, and they’re joined on the album by collaborator Sarah Deegan of Pixie Cut Rhythm Orchestra (and, full disclosure, a good friend of mine).

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The record kicks off with “Pursuit,” which feels like a sister song to “Asking For It.” “Keys clutched in my hand / If I stand up straight will you think I’m a man?” Keane whispers over thrumming guitar and echoing percussion, the lyrics invoking the cover art for the “Asking For It” single. Instead of looking back on a traumatic moment and the misogynist script imposed upon it like before, “Pursuit” places us in media res, and reminds us of all the preparation women consider on a daily basis in the hopes that it might protect us (“I thought about it all / I thought the shoes I’m wearing would help me run away from you”). The song grows louder—Keane’s voice more insistent, the guitars crunchier—the aural version of adrenaline pumping through your veins.

“I Miss My Dog” pays tribute to Keane’s late companion Poppy while avoiding potentially saccharine pitfalls. M(h)aol peer deep into the void left by Poppy’s passing—missed walks, no more “nails on wood like ASMR”—and channel that aching emptiness into a maelstrom of sound: Caffeinated blips of synth and sticky percussion form the song’s backbone, building and becoming more calamitous while Keane simply declares over and over again, as if through sheer will she could bring Poppy back, “You should be here.”

“You Are Temporary, But the Internet is Forever” starts with siren-like sounds and unyielding guitar, providing a perfect backdrop for Keane to relish in vocal fry and contemplate the casual cruelty of being blanked. Hyland’s carefully layered production, which finds beauty in overwhelming barrages of noise as well as the starkness of an isolated instrument, really stands out here. “DM:AM” pokes fun at pathetic men who use toothless excuses to explain away their bad behavior (“What if I said I didn’t mean it”), as angular guitar and bass zig zag from ear to ear. I feel like I’m back on the playground when listening to “E8/N16”; Keane playfully chants common lads’ names from the titular area of London, falling into an utterly catchy rhythm. Between Hyland’s laissez-faire vocals, the sharp stop-start melody, and a fucked-up collage of voices and sounds, “Vin Diesel” exposes consumerism as the haunted house we’re all trapped in (“Live stock in locked boxes / It’s fiver a pound down the shops”).

It’s a testament to Hyland’s talent that the noisier moments—and the album is full of them, rendering the title Something Soft another droll joke—feel notably distinct from each other. Some of the tracks have an edge to them that sets your nerve endings alight, while others are akin to TV static or crinkled cellophane in their pleasant fuzziness. The guitar at the beginning of “E8/N16” is practically a honk it’s so distorted, while the old-school beeps of a punched-in phone number become part of the staccato melody on “1-800-Call-Me-Back.” Listening to Something Soft feels like meeting the only other person in a horror movie who realizes just how fucked everything is. Yes, the reality we live in is terrifying, M(h)aol tell us with every ragged riff and thwack of a drumstick. No, you’re not alone, they reassure us with every howled lyric (particularly closer “Coda”). Yes, we can mosh while we figure it out.

Read: “M(h)aol Reach For Something Soft”

Clare Martin is a writer and cemetery enthusiast. She works in a library in Dublin, which involves less shushing than you’d think.

Scream Into the Void With M(h)aol on Something Soft

The Irish trio’s follow-up to their celebrated debut handily avoids the dreaded sophomore slump.