by David Wilikofsky
Toronto’s Maryam Said grew up in a religious household, one where popular music was largely heard from a distance (if it all). Rather than turn them off, this environment made them even more curious to discover music. Introduced to all sorts of sounds by friends in school, they eventually decided to begin writing songs and making their own music as poolblood. Their debut album, mole, is an intimate set of indie folk that will slyly pull you into its gravitational field.
Said called out artists like Nick Drake and Fiona Apple as inspirations in recent interviews, citing “the calmness and clarity” in their songwriting. While there’s little sonic similarity between those artists and these songs to my ears (I hear more kinship with the late night indie rock confessionals of artists like Long Beard or even early Mitski), I wouldn’t dispute that both calmness and clarity are perfect descriptors of their songwriting. Said has a gift for illuminating deep, complex emotions with sparse poetry. They’re “drenched in the warmth” of a love interest; they look at “a white t-shirt turned grey” while reminiscing about shared past memories. These evocative turns of phrase, which manage to speak volumes with their economy, are backed by gentle folk-inflected indie rock, instrumentals that seek to accompany rather than overpower their lyrics.
Though you can hear Said working through plenty of sonic ideas (see the shoegaze-y tones of “beam” or the quietly sweeping orchestration of closer “my little room”), there’s always a sense that each of these tracks is part of a greater whole. You could credit this to an individual element like Said’s voice, which pushes and pulls their lyrics into unexpected shapes, or the oft gently strummed guitar that forms the foundation of most tracks. But to my ears it’s more than that; it’s a shared ethos, a sense that these songs are being broadcast on the exact same wavelength. At one point, Said sings about belting out songs to “four lonely walls” in their room; mole feels like a recording straight from one of those bedroom sessions, a lovingly constructed window into Said’s private universe.