Take Me Out to a Bar/What Am I, Gatsby?

New Zealand-born, Australia-based singer/songwriter Sarah Mary Chadwick doesnt sugarcoat anything. More often than not, her songs are collections of raw-nerve emotions and depressive narratives with barely any instrumentation to soften the blow. On her 2023 album Messages to God, Chadwick filled out her spare piano dirges with hints of pedal steel or chamber pop arrangements. That relative lightness is absent from Take Me Out to a Bar / What Am I, Gatsby?, an album that once again finds Chadwick facing her demons alone at the piano, and pulling no punches when painting her pictures of bleakness, betrayal, toxicity, and breakdown. Six of the nine songs stretch past the six-minute mark, and choruses dissolve into verses on odes to alienation like "Not Cool Like NY / Not Cool Like LA" or the skeletal, almost crumbling "Soundtrack." As with much of Chadwicks catalog, the subject matter is anguished to a stunning degree. She dissects her destructive relationship with her father on "Im Not Clinging to Life," tries her best not to ruin a lovers birthday on "What Am I, Gatsby?," and relinquishes hope completely on "The Show Musnt Go On." The scent of booze and the shadow of alcohol dependency is all over the album, with many of its songs feeling form-fitted to the quiet and bleary atmosphere of an after-hours bar long after last call. Take Me Out to a Bar is a harrowing listen, so much so that the listener begins to search for the sweetness within the pain. Its there sometimes, if only in tiny glimpses. There are moments when Chadwicks stark perspectives and tormented feelings get so heavy they turn inside out, revealing a softness thats inextricable from such honest portrayals of hurt. In these moments, the intensity is undeniably beautiful, something like a distant, wearier cousin to the comparatively naive sadnesses of Moon Pix-era Cat Power or a drinking buddy for the characters on Big Stars Third. It might be difficult to find oneself in the right conditions to fully appreciate the devastating majesty of Take Me Out to a Bar / What Am I, Gatsby?, but if those conditions present themselves, having this album to commiserate with could be nothing short of life-saving. ~ Fred Thomas