Squid - Cowards
Photo Credit: Squid by Harrison Fishman
Writing about music can often feel like a trivial pursuit, especially in the face of both global and personal tumult. However, art in its various forms often serves as an antidote, or at least a temporary salve for these struggles. On a personal level, Squid have always been a band that have produced the kind of intricate, escapist music that has allowed me to weather the toughest storms.
Their first two albums, Bright Green Field and O Monolith, were favourites of ours over at Some Other Time. Odyssean efforts. Projects to inhabit and journey through. Records that rewarded attention as they gradually reveal their labyrinthine twists and turns over time. Now, they return once again with Cowards, a timely collection of tracks that interrogate evil in its many guises, as they reckon with cults, charisma and apathy in their signature sensory and richly textured style. Ahead of the release of the record, we caught up with Laurie and Anton from the band to discuss how they continue to produce some of the most exciting and richly diverse music on the music scene.
While Cowards might feel like a quick follow-up for fans, it has been a long time coming for the band. “We finished this one before Monolith came out,” Anton explains as we chat over Zoom. When they wrapped their sophomore record, they faced a dilemma: spend six more months touring Bright Green Field in anticipation of its release or channel their energy into something new. In the end they opted for the latter, “that was what we felt was the best use of our time creatively” Anton reflects.
Unlike their previous albums, which took shape amid hectic touring schedules, this one was forged in a rare period of uninterrupted focus. “There were two great residencies we had during the writing of Cowards, one in Cornwall and one in Margate,” Laurie explains. At the end of each week, the band performed a show, the culmination of that week’s work and an opportunity to test their ideas in a live setting. From these sessions, the skeleton of the new record quickly emerged.
Photo Credit: Squid by Harrison Fishman
Since the release of their breakthrough single “Houseplants”, Squid’s approach to making music has remained largely unchanged. The band continue to rely on their unique creative bond as a primary source of inspiration. These connections have allowed them to evolve over time while sustaining their distinctive DNA, reflecting on this Laurie explains, “I think the rehearsal room feels inspiring for us in general. When we improvise together, I’m never certain what music will come out of it.”
On a practical level, individual band members might introduce a rhythm, melody, or song structure to the group but their biggest breakthroughs still come through collective efforts. “We do everything together,” Anton notes. “Nobody would ever bring in a finished song by themselves.” More often than not, tracks have emerged slowly from fragments of ideas or scraps of inspiration shaped by what Laurie describes as the band’s “similar yet disparate musical tastes.” This is a formula that has led to the richly varied sounds heard across the entirety of the band's discography.
On Cowards, that same organic, iterative approach was put to the test once again, resulting in a record that sees them take yet another significant creative leap forward. “I think we’ve become better songwriters,” Anton considers, “we’re learning how to say more with fewer things.” Compared to the sprawling complexity of O Monolith, the new record feels leaner but never at the expense of the band's enduring experimental spirit. This newfound efficiency also extends beyond the sonic components of the project and is reflected in the album’s themes, which appear more rounded and singular on Cowards.
Across the record the band weave complex narratives and recite cautionary tales that unfold alongside their signature kaleidoscopic instrumentation. Lyrically, Cowards is perhaps their most direct project to date. While previous releases have often leaned into abstract, fragmented storytelling, this record interrogates the nature of evil in a very direct way that feels increasingly urgent in the midst of the current cultural zeitgeist. Throughout the tracklist, the band grapples with themes of cultish devotion, unchecked charisma, and societal apathy, weaving these ideas into surreal yet compelling narratives.
Lead single Crispy Skin is a perfect example of the project's clarity, as it dives headfirst into a shameless world of unencumbered cannibalism. This grotesque imagery serves as a vehicle for themes of consumption, power, and the breakdown of collective moral fiber. The track holds up a mirror to society, exposing collective complicity in a system that appears to erode our moral standing at an ever increasing rate. Acting as the perfect palette cleanser for the rest of the record, the track forces the listener to sit with feelings of discomfort and confront the dark undercurrents shaping the modern world.
Beyond their new record, Squid have also been expanding their creative horizons in new ways, especially with their record label, “INK”, which launched back in 2020 as “a hub for our solo music and collabs that exist outside of the linear Squid timeline!!” Discussing the venture, Laurie explains, “It’s really nice to have a space that doesn’t feel constrained by financial pressures.” He continues, “That’s not to say that there aren’t loads of great mini labels doing similar things, it’s just that making cash out of it isn’t our aim, which gives us more artistic freedom.”
For the band, this desire and search for creative liberty appeared to begin with their decision to sign with Warp Records, a choice that seemed at odds with their early releases which were more entrenched in the dominant, post-punk aesthetic of the time. However, it was a move that signalled a broader ambition. Their decision to partner with a label renowned for fostering genre-defying artists reflected a desire to move beyond rigid classifications and embrace experimentation on their own terms.
This commitment to sustaining artistic freedom appears to extend beyond just their label and into a wider creative philosophy. Whether through their improvisational songwriting process, their willingness to reflect on modern morality, or their ability to constantly evolve without losing their core identity, Squid have carved out a unique space for themselves within the British music scene.
With Cowards, they once again reaffirm their ability to craft music that is as immersive as it is unsettling. In a world increasingly shaped by shallow forms of consumption, their intricate compositions and urgent themes demand active engagement. The band offer no easy answers, only space to confront, reflect, and question. Through their relentless sonic evolution and refusal to compromise artistic integrity, they continue to prove that art is anything but trivial, it is an essential form of escapism and perhaps more importantly, a means of deciphering the world around us, perhaps now more than ever.
Cowards by Squid is out now via Warp Records.
