CMAT - Euro-Country CMAT

During the first of September’s double-instore performances (both of which sold out in approximately 10 seconds), CMAT declared that, at Resident, we’d always treated her like an international pop icon, even when she wasn’t one. Now, with album number 3, a viral social media dance sensation (created by Brighton local Sam Morris and dubbed the “Woke Macarena”), a stellar debut performance on Glastonbury’s Pyramid stage, and a second Mercury Prize nomination, she’s recognised as the undeniable breakout star we always knew she was destined to be.

Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson’s follow up to her two Resident AOTY top-tenners finds her expanding her musical horizons, embracing an epic, indie-pop sound full of maximalist brilliance, whilst maintaining the country-inspired, witty honesty  that has been her trademark from the get-go. It’s hilarious, cutting, capable of rousing the most jaded of hearts, and set to conquer this world and the next.

As with her previous work, the pop-cultural and the personal are intertwined, as Ciara examines her emotions through the lens of celebrity. Lyrical touchstones include Princess Diana, self-esteem as therapy, the financial crash, rejection, heartbreak, irrational anger towards Jamie Oliver’s petrol station delis - the latter of which is delivered astride a galloping steed of kosmische indie-pop that feels like it could keep going forever.

EURO-COUNTRY’s album artwork finds CMAT mirroring the pose of Jean-Léon Gérôme’s Truth Coming Out of Her  Well, albeit transposed to a shopping centre fountain near her hometown. It’s a camp, kitsch culture clash of the mystical and reality, a visual shorthand for the idiosyncratic nature of CMAT’s songwriting. Who else would shout out Irish folklore’s Cú Chulainn and Atomic Kitten’s Kerry Katona in the same verse? Only Dunboyne’s Diana.

We’re delighted that the world has embraced our favourite country-pop songstress in the manner we’ve always known she was deserving of… even if that means we now have to share her venturous, laser-pointed home truths with stadiums of congruently adoring fans - ‘coz everyone wants to be a cowboy, baby!