Album Review: The Preatures – GIRLHOOD
2 min read
The Preatures release their sophomore album, GIRLHOOD, featuring Jack Moffitt on guitar, Thomas Champion on bass, Luke Davison on drums, and Izzi Manfredi as the front woman on keys and vocals. As the title suggests, the songs explore the coming of age from a female perspective, specifically the perspective of Izzi growing up in Sydney, Australia. With this more introspective angle that exposes Izzi’s personal life experience, comes a more mature sound.
The Preatures keep their identity in tact with their retro rock vibe; they had a solid foundation and understanding of who they are even back in 2014 when they debuted Blue Planet Eyes, and have further developed their sound. Each of the musicians bring a spectrum of well developed technique on their respective instruments to the album, ensuring that the music itself is engaging all the way through GIRLHOOD. Each track offers something new, a space for them to reinvent their sound; it’s malleable as they shape it into anything they desire from the high energy track Girlhood, to the funk feel of Mess It Up, the more vunerable feel of First Night or the smooth synth sound of Magick.
The Preatures’ own Jack Moffit served as producer on GIRLHOOD, also engaging with Burke Reid (Courtney Barnett, Olympia, DMA’s) and Eric J. Dubowsky (Flume, Nick Murphy). With the success of their first album release and the solid reputation that they have built up, they were able to take production up a notch by working with respected audio engineer Bob Clearmountain known for his work with legends like Bowie, Springsteen and INXS.
The Preatures have contributed a powerful collection of honest and intimate songs to the category ‘rock music from the female perspective’ continuing the work of other notable female fronted bands: The Pretenders, Divinyls, No Doubt, Blondie, and Siouxsie & the Banshees. Having said that, this album does not serve to ostracize any person or group of people, but rather bring us together in many shared life experiences. It is easy to connect with The Preatures’ music and lyrics as it takes you back to your own early experiences. One of my favorite lines from GIRLHOOD has got to be “I open my eyes under the water” from Yanada- and honestly, who did not try that at least once growing up.
