Goddess - Goddess

There’s something pleasingly straightforward about this self-titled debut record from Goddess. The project comes helmed by Savages drummer Fay Milton and a carousel of female and non-binary collaborators – with the added help of erstwhile bandmate Ayse Hassan – who, together, weave their distinctive sounds and energies in ways which both complement and contrast. Opener ‘Little Dark’ meshes a steely vocal from Shingai – a complete 360 from Noisettes’ recent-ish viral turn ‘Never Forget You’, for one – with a quietly clamouring backing. Meanwhile, both ‘Shadows’, with Ex:Re – aka Daughter’s Elena Tonra - and Pumarosa’s Isabel Muñosz-Newsome on ‘Bad Child’ present precisely as the mind’s eye might conjure – both making deft use of space, drama and their respective vocalists’ knack for heartstring-pulling.

Similarly, the pairing of Black Honey’s Izzy B Phillips’ infantine vocal with the evocation of a child’s jewellery box (‘Diamond Dust’) just makes sense somehow, and ‘Bounce’ has Grove club-bound, as their percussive vocal adds to an already hypnotic synth-led combination. The star of the show, however, is ‘Fuckboy’, on which the cut-glass accent of multi-disciplinary artist Salvia jars with the industrial noise of menacing basslines and ‘80s drum sounds. “He’s a fuckboy / Down on his luck boy / Couldn’t get it up boy,” she delivers in a rhythm so tantalisingly close to that of Billie Eilish’s ‘Bad Guy’ it’s as if she’s conjured its demon cousin. As a project designed intentionally not to tour (Fay is one of the founders of climate change protest group Music Declares Emergency), it’s refreshing that there appears to be no intention beyond the record itself, whether it stands alone or continues as a series.