‘Override’ opts for endurance in a situation that’s urging you to “do yourself a favour and get out”. Tor explains, “They tell you the fair won’t survive without them. But you can override.”

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Maries says of the track: “As I get older, and I’ve just had this diagnosis, and the world’s a fucking mess, the idea of being able to have fun or fall in love with someone is the ultimate rebellion, isn’t it? It just feels totally radical these days. And it seems to happen less as life gets more complicated. Things are only going to get worse, there’s no point being blue sky about it, but there’s also fun to be found in this two minute whizz around that we all have.”

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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:

1. Metalhorse
2. Nothing Worth Winning
3. The Test
4. Override
5. Dark Horse Friend feat. Hugh Cornwell
6. Life’s Unfair
7. Plans
8. Gas
9. Comedic Timing
10. Strange Gift
11. Moon Explodes

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Recorded at her flat and Invada Studios, CACTI is a huge step up for the artist. Though every bit as unrepentant as Billy Nomates’ debut, CACTI comes from a much more exposed place and sees Tor further develop her instinctive, inventive songwriting and production. Unafraid to wade into the traumas of the past two years and the eerie sense of apathy that lingers, alongside heartache and more political themes, the 12-track collection openly confronts uncomfortable truths, as Tor puts it, “70-80% of being bold is about being vulnerable as hell.”

Maries said: “Writing CACTI took just over a year. I wrote very intensely and then none at all. (This seems to be the way I work best). I picked up old drum machines, mapped out things in my kitchen with the same small micro keyboard I always use and then raided the cupboards and rooms at Invada Studios, to play and experiment with old synths, an upright piano, this weird organ thing. I hope everyone finds their own narrative in CACTI. I think it’s about surviving it all.”

Billy Nomates also shares a new single, ‘balance is gone’, which tackles those struggles head on, charting her attempts to find purpose. About the song, Tor says: “It’s a lot to ask, balance. Does anybody feel on kilter? Has anybody achieved all that harmony? I don’t think it’s a unique chase. And some days, it’s good to acknowledge it got up and left the room.”

CACTI:

1. balance is gone
2. black curtains in the bag
3. blue bones (deathwish)
4. CACTI
5. saboteur forcefield
6. roundabout sadness
7. spite
8. fawner
9. same gun
10. vertigo
11. apathy is wild
12. blackout signal

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