Bacchanalia Magazine

by Reb Jordin

Mary Timony, singer songwriter and underground indie-rock legend, is to release her first solo album after fifteen years on February 23rd . ‘Untame the Tiger’, Timony’s fifth solo album, is a heartfelt and vulnerable acoustic driven album written at a crucially transformative stage in the artist’s life. The album follows Timony’s struggle to self-empowerment following the conclusion of a long-term relationship and the tragic passing of her parents. ‘Untame the Tiger’ beautifully navigates the sensitive topic of loss and how that changes a person helping the listener to feel represented through the artform of music.

The record begins with ‘No Thirds’ “a song about losing everything and having to keep on going,” says Timony. “I wanted the verses to sound like a wide-open barren space, like driving across a desert, because that is what the song is about—losing people and the feeling that your future is a giant, wide-open blank space.” The track swims with poetic lyrics like ‘I still want to know what I’ve really never known. We wonder through the garden but don’t want to wonder alone’ that conjure images of the Gardens of Babylon and other equally grandiose lands. The theme of being desperate for answers in a climate of unknown is continued into the next track ‘Summer’. The song begins on a solemn note exclaiming ‘I wanna know what I don’t know now’ until it dissolves amongst its killer twin guitar solo conclusion. Hailing from her inspirations of The Kinks, early Dio and Elf, and Rory Gallagher, Timony exclaims “I was also listening to a lot of Gerry Rafferty’s first solo album and was inspired to have two simultaneous guitar solos.” 

‘Untame the Tiger’ continues to build into it’s lead single ‘Dominoes’, a song about your partner not being the right person for you, them leaving and then the final acceptance over the relatable event. Beginning with a catchy beat, ‘Dominoes’ keeps the listeners on their toes as they process intimate lyrics like ‘the second you were gone I realised that was a lie’. The track feels like the universal experience of putting all your energy into a love that is only draining the life out of you, even its title is reminiscent of everything around you collapsing and failing in one cruel game.

The album also tackles the subject of loneliness, an example of this being single ‘The guest’ where Timony appears to welcome loneliness home as the only constant in her life. The artist even went so far as to say, “I was imagining loneliness as a house guest who keeps knocking on your door. I thought it would be funny to say loneliness is the only one who always comes back.” Timony really does live up to her guitar hero status within this album ( no.95 in Rolling Stone’s Greatest Guitarists Of All Time list that came out in October) a moment of this being within ‘The Guest’ where the high guitar notes feel almost feverish reflecting the sickly nature of loneliness.

The penultimate song of the record is the ritualistic sounding title track. A song which ties the album’s themes together with lyrics like ‘I thought I was done with you and the tiger was tamed’, linking to Timony’s rebirth after the drastic changes within her life that lead her to write this album as an outlet for her heavy feelings. However, this is song can easily be left to the listeners own interpretation, whether that be greeting back mental health issues in a relapse of illness, or whether that be saying goodbye to a relationship that you believed would be the one.

Throughout the record, Timony makes the listener feel included in the emotions within the songs. As the album draws to a close the final track ‘Not the only one’ draws the artist and listener together due too the brutal ways of life. Timony sings, ‘not the only one we’re all riders around the sun’ implying that life is a mutual struggle across humanity. With a slower tempo ‘Untame the Tiger’ ends with a bittersweet note of acceptance of what life will throw at you which will ultimately shape you into the strongest version of yourself. “As an artist, you have to keep dealing with your shit. Otherwise, you can’t keep making your art.” – Mary Timony.

Go and give the three released singles from ‘Untame the Tiger’ a listen now and presave this spectacular album to be ready for its release on February 23rd !