Growing up and getting older can be really exciting, filled with firsts and new experiences, but it can also be heartbreakingly sad—Lizzy McAlpine explores all those emotions on her third release, Older.
The album, which dropped today, tracks the singer’s feelings about adulthood, and the inevitability and oftentimes heartbreak of growing older, but it also tackles her feelings about being in the public eye—something she’s been increasingly more aware of since her debut album was released in 2020.
In the album’s title track, and the first single released from it, McAlpine opines about being “stuck in a loop” that’s made her sick to her stomach. The song, which was released Feb. 13, also is deeply nostalgic—a feeling that anyone who is venturing into adulthood can acutely relate to. In the song, McAlpine sings “Over and over, watch it all pass. Mom’s getting older, I’m wanting it back, where no one is dying and no one is hurt, and I have been good to you instead of making it worse.” The song, which is tinged with regret, is one of the highest points in an album full of hauntingly beautiful high points.
Another one of the emotional standout points on the album is “March,” the second-to-last song on Older.
The song is about McAlpine’s father, who passed away in March 2020. The singer has featured a song inspired by her father on each of her three releases so far, including “Headstones and Land Mines” on 2020’s Give Me a Minute, and “chemtrails” on her second release, 2022’s Five Seconds Flat.
The piano ballad, “March,” sees McAlpine at her most raw, with very little production on her vocals as she sings “One year older, but somehow I feel younger. I see him more now that he’s gone, or maybe I just see him in everything.” The song also has McAlpine admitting that she “didn’t know it would be this hard.”
The album as a whole feels more raw and intimate than McAlpine’s previous two releases. The singer attributed that feeling to “Older” being recorded live, with the entire band recording at once. While McAlpine’s 2022 release, Five Seconds Flat is brimming with electronics, “Older” is an entirely acoustic album—just featuring McAlpine’s voice, acoustic guitars, strings and piano.
The difference in the production seems reflective of McAlpine’s confidence in herself and her music, a result of growing, gaining experience and becoming more self-assured—and entirely symbolic of what ‘Older’ is about.
McAlpine seems wisened in the album, especially in retrospective tracks like “Drunk Running,” in which she sings “What if it was all my fault? What if I drove you to it? I was only honest sometimes, and I think you knew it. Make a person out of memories they won’t live up to it. I’m so sorry I stayed when I shouldn’t,” throughout the song’s bridge.
Sure, the song references an incident in which someone breaks their leg while running intoxicated, but the ability to reflect on an incident and take knowledge from it shows a sort of wisdom that can only be gained through getting older and maturing.
She also shows a maturity that’s found in adulthood when she sings“Maybe it doesn’t matter who the blame gets assigned to,” in the song “Broken Glass.”
Just as getting older can oftentimes break your heart, Older is a raw and deeply emotive album. But it’s not all bleak, there can be a lot of beauty in growing up—there’s a pride found in maturing, and realizing that you’re able to look back on people and events and think about them from different perspectives, and maybe in a more positive way. McAlpine has found a way to masterfully capture that entire range of feelings found in growing up in Older.
Fans can catch McAlpine on the road throughout the summer in support of Older. The singer is playing venues along the East and West coasts, before hitting the festival circuit and performing at Splendour in the Grass Festival in Byron Bay, Australia, Lollapalooza in Chicago and Hinterland Music Festival in Saint Charles, Iowa. Afterwards, McAlpine will tour through Europe in October.
Older is available on all streaming platforms.
0 comments on “Lizzy McAlpine Heartbreakingly Captures the Emotions of Growing Up on Third Album ‘Older’”