Light, Dark, LightLight, Dark, Light Again: An Album Review

By: Emily Eade

The album Light, Dark, Light Again is Angie McMahon's second studio album. The title of the album expresses the emotion within by showing the connection between the emotional and sensual worlds, both being gentle and heavy. This album would continue to follow what McMahon is known for, her heavy-hearted songs full of both beautiful and all-too-relatable imagery.

“Saturn Returning” is the first track off of the album. This song would be the first single from the album. The song starts with the sound of rain falling, seconds later the fluttering piano keys join in, making this perfect connection between the instrumental and lyrics. This song is inspired by astrology and how your “Saturn Return” signals a transformation that will take place during a specific astrological period. This can be seen through the lyrics, “I’m gonna surrender my keys to the universe. Please, always catch me the way that you caught me. I'm gonna let Saturn returning distort me. I just wanna be wide awake when I’m 40.” McMahon uses this song as a way to express the biggest lesson she had in this chapter of her life. This lesson would be the value of keeping a gentle and loving relationship with herself. 

“Fireball Whiskey” is the second track and the third single that came from this album. This track starts with very soft, simple, and slow-paced acoustics that have simple undertones of Americana. McMahon uses this song to express our troubles with anxiety, and how we can often use self-medication to handle these feelings. “Letting Go” is the fourth track and the second single that came from this album. This fast-paced song was originally written to be a piano ballad but became this big-hearted rock song instead. McMahon uses this song to express learning to not dwell on the past and to embrace the new knowledge that comes from making

mistakes. This can be seen through the lyrics she repeats multiple times toward the end of the song, “It’s okay, it’s okay. Make mistakes, make mistakes.”

“Exploding” would be this album's fourth single, McMahon would state in an interview, "I wanted the song to sound as big as flying through the galaxy, to be a space to fall apart into. It’s not always clear where we’re supposed to fall apart, but I just know it’s important that we do. It was born out of a song prompt from Ruby Gill: ‘Approach something new with an animal body and an open mind and see where it takes you…you could zoom out really far and go to space’.” 

Angie McMahon is an upcoming folk-pop musician, who came to light in 2019 while going on tour with Hozier. It is clear McMahon puts raw emotion into every piece she releases. Light, Dark, Light Again follows exactly that, she uses music to express her anxiety, emotions, and mistakes.