Words by Willa Rudolph
The London-based four-piece band Big Moon recently played an epic show at Music Hall of Williamsburg (on 11/15/23 with local faves May Rio and Fiona Silver) blessing New York with their special brand of British folk-pop rock. With a daring album cover for their most-recently released LP Here Is Everything (Deluxe) featuring lead singer Juliette Jackson’s pregnant belly, Big Moon creates a unique world of witty and intelligent songwriting, the all-encompassing sounds of a very full band (strings, piano, wind, synths, drums, reverbed and clear vocals) and the inner workings of new motherhood.
Indie pop-rock that you can dance to is not as easy to come by as it once was in the heyday of Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Sharon Van Etten, and The 1975, so I find the upbeat stylings of Big Moon nostalgic, yet contemporary, and lots of fun.
Big Moon, formed in 2014, released the deluxe version of their most recent album Here is Everything on October 13th, 2023 (the “non-deluxe” edition came out a year ago minus the four added bonus tracks) and have recently enjoyed a tour of summer festivals and shows in DC, Brooklyn, and Toronto, looking forward to a tour of Europe in December. See their packed Glastonbury performance here.
From the album, I especially loved the song “Suckerpunch.” With such a bold song title, the tune deals with the questioning of identity after becoming a parent. The song contains elements of Wolf Alice, Lumineers, and Big Thief with a chorus that hauntingly bellows, “I guess I could still be surprised.”
The song “Trouble” (track 8) has the most plays on Spotify with deep percussion and a dance-y guitar riff, and lyrics addressing the inevitable presence of change in life, more specifically, the ephemeral nature of trouble. Accompanied by full-bodied, choral backing vocals, Juliette sings:
Trouble don’t last forever / trouble is your memories do
But every time I remember / Something is a little less tru
Trouble don’t last forever / trouble is your memories might
But every time I remember / Something is a little less right
In Here is Everything, with a deep and resonant voice that has a similarly velvety quality to Nico, Juliette sings of the highs and lows of new motherhood as bandmates Celia Archer, Fem Ford, and Soph Nathan back her up with an upbeat and intimate close knit net of sound.
From the LP’s press release courtesy of Twnty Tree PR : Here Is Everything was mostly self-produced, with the expert guidance and expertise of co-producers CECIL (Self Esteem, Jehnny Beth, PJ Harvey) and the GRAMMY award-winning producer Ben Allen (Gnarls Barkley, Deerhunter, and the producer of The Big Moon’s 2020 album Walking Like We Do).
Big Moon at Music Hall of Williamsburg / Photo Credit: Emilio Herce
Check out more from Big Moon here.