ALBUM REVIEW: Clap Your Hands Say Yeah – New Fragility

CYHSY/Secretly Distribution

Released: 29.01.21

15 years into a fine career, CYHSY’s Alec Ounsworth is taking a breath. New Fragility is a record of reflection, wisdom and maturity. He looks in: depression, divorce, getting older; and then out, confronting what he sees around him. Musically matured, the edges are smoothed and moments of painful beauty emerge, as on ballad Mirror Song and the grand orchestral crescendo of Innocent Weight.

At times his stoicism lapses; he rages in Hesitating Nation “you just don’t care, everyone gathered round the toilet bowl!” The ferocity and passion is still there but it is channelled through stomping, triumphant pop. He manages to merge all of this wonderfulness in the title track, lamenting “I can’t believe the things I do to myself” as drums pound over his piano.