Billy Nomates, the project of the Bristol-based songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist Tor Maries, today announces her new album, Metalhorse, released on May 16 via Invada Records. The announcement is joined by the new single, ‘The Test’, which was premiered by Lauren Laverne on BBC Radio 6 Music and is out now here.
A propulsive heartland rock track, ‘The Test’ is rebellious in nature, driving through Tor’s increasingly powerful vocal line atop a low humming bass and sparking piano interjections. “A heart is an engine” sings Tor, with the track erupting into a chorus dripping with defiance.
The first track written for Metalhorse, ‘The Test’ encapsulates the turmoil of the last 18 months and the bewilderment that Billy Nomates is still going in spite of it all. Maries describes it in almost spiritual terms: “It’s working at something against the odds and feeling like someone’s helping you from the other side, and if they see you that’s the test,” she says. “I really feel that when we’re playing it live. Like, with everything that’s going on, I can’t believe this is surviving.”
Metalhorse is Billy Nomates’ third studio release, following 2023’s critically acclaimed, CACTI, and her self-titled 2020 debut. Metalhorse is a fuller album, exploring blues, folk and piano-driven arrangements that take Billy Nomates’ stark punk sound in a more pastoral direction. Produced by James Trevascus and recorded at Paco Loco in Seville, Spain, Metalhorse is the first Billy Nomates album to be made in a studio and with a full band. Enlisting bass player Mandy Clarke (KT Tunstall, The Go! Team) and drummer Liam Chapman (Rozi Plain, BMX Bandits), who round out Billy Nomates live, the trio were booked into Paco Loco just three months after the passing of Maries’ dad to Parkinson’s. “We were so close and our bond was music,” she says of her relationship with her father. “That was my safety and protection in the world. Even in the care home, as things were getting worse, I’d visit him and he’d ask me what I was doing. I’d show him the new demos, or I’d have been on the radio. It sort of saved everything from being shit, because we had this positive thing to talk about.”
Metalhorse:
- Metalhorse
- Nothing Worth Winning
- The Test
- Override
- Dark Horse Friend feat. Hugh Cornwell
- Life’s Unfair
- Plans
- Gas
- Comedic Timing
- Strange Gift
- Moon Explodes
