Baby Queen - I Hope You Don’t Remember Me

In the three years since the release of her debut, 2023’s ‘Quarter Life Crisis’, a lot seems to have changed for Bella Latham’s Baby Queen. While her early work always thrived thanks to her candid, confessional approach to songwriting, her debut was - even in its messy uncertainty - a definitively more bubblegum sweet offering than its follow-up.

Titled with the self-effacing sentiment ‘I Hope You Don’t Remember Me’, there’s a much more melancholy tone to her second record that’s quickly outlined within the opening, powerful piano chimes of ‘Abigail’: “Can’t bear to look at the sun when it shines / All of my dreams played out in black and white / I don’t like the things that I thought that I’d liked.” It’s a sombre start for an album that feels so weighted down by its emotional turmoil, while somehow still managing to carry some sense of her whip-smart humour. From the sugary seesaw of ‘Permanently Obsessed’ (few songs can sound so giddy sonically while still carrying off the line “There is something wrong in my head / Like the chemicals are all fucked up”) to the snarled bitterness at the heart of ‘Spite’, it’s hard not to get the feeling that whoever, or whatever, was the cause of these feelings has certainly left a mark.

And yet, despite the darkness so clearly on display throughout the album’s 11 tracks, there’s also a confidence clearly shining through. The darkly-tinged ‘Tongue-Tied’ pulsates between rage and vulnerability (“I still wanna fuck you like I love you, maybe I do / I still feel the agony each time I think about you”) in a way that feels urgent but affirming, proving that pain really can be turned into purpose. An album built to reclaim her narrative and propel her forwards, ‘I Hope You Don’t Remember Me’ - despite its title - manages to succeed on both accounts.