Have you ever found yourself in the middle of a conversation and realized you’re being fed a prewritten script? I recently caught up with a friend who had gone through several dramatic changes since we’d last spoken—a divorce, a new home, a new job—but no matter how much I politely pried, she kept giving me buzzwords: boundaries and self-care; yoga and gratitude and growth. Slowly, I realized that she’d known exactly what she’d tell me before I ever said hello: that clear, linear version of events she had learned to trot out, one that glossed over any disorderly details in service of premeditated lessons she now felt empowered to share.
On Eliza McLamb’s second album, Good Story, the singer-songwriter confronts this universal instinct to self-narrativize. “Catch it quick/Frame the image/Make your meaning before you’ve lived it,” she sings on “Mausoleum,” chiding herself for trying to nail down a story rather than inhabit her present experience. We’re all liable to these behaviors, but McLamb feels their pull acutely. On her debut album, 2024’s Going Through It, she excavated details of her childhood trauma and difficult relationships, topics she’s also tackled as a stirring essayist and podcaster, and learned how to package them as art. On Good Story, McLamb takes a step back, wondering what all these anecdotes add up to.
McLamb and her band—which includes Jacob Blizard (who’s played with Lucy Dacus); bassist Ryan Ficano; keyboardist Sarah Goldstone (who’s played with Chappell Roan and boygenius); and Death Cab For Cutie drummer Jason McGerr—construct this version of events on a solid indie-rock foundation. There are tinges of Lilith Fair pop-rock, especially in McLamb’s lilting delivery, and echoes of her contemporaries like Dacus and Soccer Mommy. But the tracklist takes gentle swerves that add depth and variety: “Better Song” ends with a minute-long, scorching guitar solo; at the close of the album’s A-side, the brief, subdued “Promise”—all gentle vocals and finger-picked guitar—is immediately followed by “Water Inside the Fence,” a continuous build of creeping anxiety that ends with screeching feedback and pounding drums.
In the album’s weaker moments—as on the downbeat “California” and “Girls I Know”—the arrangements don’t quite match the gracefulness of McLamb’s lyrics. But its strongest songs showcase her dexterity with shifts in tone, as in the chorus of “Like the Boys,” where she matches bittersweet lyrics about gender and agency (“I like the boys like the boys like to shoot their guns/Something I can hold in my hands, pretending to be someone”) with a bulletproof, belted melody. “Suffering” opens with filigreed piano and gentle self-mockery (“Poor maudlin child … Such tragedy/Befell me so early”) before a crush of pop-punk guitars as McLamb admits to courting her own pain: “If I’m without it,” she sings, digging into her lower range with a wink, “I can’t figure out the point of anything.” Her descriptions of emotional realities are striking, but she’s just as sharp with tangible details: vacuum-sealed chicken feet; dishwater-blonde hair; lipstick that melts in the sun.
McLamb’s debut focused on pivotal moments in her life, retracing the plot points and adding a layer of distanced wisdom. Good Story takes a more self-reflexive perspective: These are songs about the practice of narrativizing, with lyrics that question the very act of retelling a story in hopes of guiding others. “Mausoleum” is an extended metaphor for building a personal narrative around trauma; on “Talisman,” she considers how life’s path always seems clearer through the lens of nostalgia. “Going back in time/I see everything fine,” she sings. “Maybe that’s why I’ve been making stories my whole life.” On the title track, she dissects the compulsion to package real life as a “good story,” comparing it to “landing a plane three feet from the ground.” She knows she owes herself the chance at a messier, truer self-conception, so what keeps her telling the story instead: the hope of being understood? The pressures of commercialized art? The fear of life’s inevitable contradictions? By the album’s conclusion, McLamb doesn’t answer these questions definitively. Instead, she considers another habit that helps her see herself in a more honest and complex light. “I pick a fight just to see me win,” she sings, “I love getting free just because I can.” Even if she’s compelled to keep telling stories, McLamb knows how to make them feel like candid conversations: unflinching and empathetic, their unruliness in service of honesty.
