Amy Shark – Love Monster Album Review

Track List

I Got You
Adore
All Loved Up
I Said Hi
The Idiot
Never Coming Back
Leave Us Alone
Psycho
Don’t Turn Around
Middle of the Night
Mess Her Up
The Slow Song
I’m A Liar
You Think I Think I Sound Like God

Australian singer-songwriter Amy Shark’s debut album is a really well worked selection of heartfelt songs. Full of meaningful lyrics and structured like an audible version of a romantic drama series, Love Monster is one of those albums best listened to with your full attention rather than left on in the background. The poignant lyrics do well to paint a picture of Amy’s life whilst remaining accessible to a larger audience in this emotionally charged Indie-Pop album.

There’s no denying this young woman is a talented singer and Amy Shark’s vocal range shines here with an impressive variety in both timbre and mood throughout the album. Upbeat songs like I Got You and All Loved Up feel much lighter in tone, playing on themes of love with a gleeful bounce and a catchy chorus to emphasise these emotions. In comparison, Mess Her Up stands out here with a much darker tone through the use of minor chords mixed with some decent composition and effects including muffling to show a good range in style.

If there’s one thing missing from this album it comes from the lack of a show-stopping track to really put this album in the spotlight for a larger audience. There’s no denying the talent Amy has and the lyrical content has enough heartfelt meaning and interesting storytelling to make it an impressive album in its own right but it’s also difficult to pinpoint a definitive stand-out track. There will be some who prefer the bouncy, upbeat tracks, others who prefer the slower songs like The Slow Song or the darker toned track Mess Her Up and although diverse and rightly unique, Love Monster doesn’t have that one defining track.

Still, Love Monster is a really impressive album and as a personal observation, some of the tracks here feel quite similar to some of Avril Lavigne’s very early work back in the 90s. The lyrical content is both super specific and broad enough to reach a large enough audience and the tonally different tracks all tell their own story. With a tonally sound structure, some good compositional work and an audibly pleasing voice, whether Amy Shark’s debut album is likely to be one that hits the mainstream or catapults Amy into the spotlight is anyone’s guess but there’s no denying this is a decent album and well worth a listen.