"When Will It End" by Izzie Derry
Review
I suppose that writing reviews, like most other activities, is a form of learning process. I'd like to think that I'm slowly restraining my tendency to let enthusiasm for a song or artist not run onto articles of a length which bore more than inspire. Not sure how close I am with that one yet.
Another lesson has been dubbing a release the artist's "best one yet". Every time I've used it, I've meant it, but then inevitably with gifted artists who progress with their creativity, I find myself needing to use it again. I'm not sure that's necessarily wrong as each usage was honest at the time, but I do spot myself deploying it more frequently than I thing I'd anticipated.
I certainly have to consider saying it about the release today of "When Will It End" by Izzie Derry, but then many of you may think the same, despite the scintillating run of songs she has been on for such a while now.
You need to work hard at your craft to keep on moving forwards in this way, as Izzie so obviously does, but also have the artistic antennae to keep on picking up new ideas for songs & the emotional intelligence to express subtle ideas which hadn't already appeared in your work. I'm not sure these can be learned (developed perhaps) but again, with Izzie you can tick them off. Unfortunately as regular readers will know, she's also experienced emotional challenges which clearly inform her best work but which one might wish she's escaped.
You will form your own opinion on the "best" front regarding "When Will It End" but I think most listeners will consider it her biggest sound to date.
There is an irony here: all her releases for the past few years have been fully arranged for her band. This, as I'll explain is no exception. However looking back at the Izzie Derry gigs I've been to of late & looking forwards to at least four potential ones, all of them have been solo acoustic ones. It's great to see her gigging so much but logistically & economically it's hard for her to play many with her band. Her stripped back renditions have been just as moving (in some cases possibly more so) as the studio ones but with "When Will It End" it is possible that much of the essential nature of what you hear is woven up in the textures & power which come from the playing of Izzie on guitar & layered vocals, Herbie Walker on keyboards, Tom Hammerton on guitar, Matt Boyes on bass and Jacob Andrews on drums: not a huge band but they certainly make a collective impression. (You probably are aware that Izzie is getting more and more involved in production & co-produced this with Sam Clines who also carried out the mix).
I shan't inflict a recap of numerous recent past reviews on you, but I'm sure you have noted a trend in intensity rising in her songs, lashings of emotional intelligence taking foreground, reassertion of her own agency and confrontation of bad behaviours in preference to appeasement. Some of this I ascribed to an "angry Izzie" but Izzie being Izzie, any senses of disappointment, rage or disgust were balanced with her characteristic humanity & I dare say a refusal to wallow in any sense of victimhood which would ultimately corrode her own identity.
It's possibly to see aspects of "When Will It End" as a summation (culmination?) of this songwriting arc.. certainly her aim as expressed here is "to feel human again" and so it's hard not to read into the words the entire joined up history of the narratives across many songs.
But to return to where I came in, the first thing which will strike many listeners is the sound. Izzie probably has been placed in "folk" categories in the past or more vaguely the great catch all "singer-songwriter" but this song (as with plenty of others of late) has little in common with what people's expectations given such a label might be. "When Will It End" swings like anything and if you love it for that alone it's understandable. I personally would seriously want to hear it live with a lineup equivalent to what you get here. Much more travel in this musical direction & I'd not be surprised if a brass section came on board. "Izzie Derry & her Big Band"?
John Lennon famously said "I like to write about me, because I know me" which is core to his profile as an often brutally honest writer. Izzie's songs are virtually all First Person ones too: her route to her truth starts with the person she knows best & this is where she is now on that journey. I imagine that aspects of self exploration, reflection & even catharsis lie within this as well as it providing a vehicle for chiding those who've disappointed or hurt her.
The key refrain seems to consist of "I'll smile just like I rehearsed, I'll smile and watch it get worse" which if you unpack it not only has a rather meta reference to her own role as a performer but also provides one of the most uneasiest phrases I've heard in any song: you can literally take the meaning as reflecting every possible response from despair to defiance and in the end, this idea of optimism/pessimism ambiguity imbues the whole of "When Will It End". Personally and rather tentatively, I would prefer it to be a song of hope, one based on the sense of increased agency I've been picking up from other songs. However taken on its own account, it reads either way, though the absence of a question mark may be significant too. At any rate, as an example of maturity of songwriting this duality is a sign of great accomplishment. Which Izzie is likely to exceed next time out on isn't she?
