Following our recent mini series of goat-related acts, we trot along now to the lovely sound of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne born singer-songwriter and her Hooves, and two splendid number from the 2012 album Your Truly, Cellophane Nose. Eccentric, inventive, humorously melancholic, these exemplify her stop-start energy, and that distinctive, haunting voice, which has a touch of early, downbeat Alison Goldfrapp, and that splendid horse-loving Neil Hannon from The Divine Comedy, but also something else entirely, a half mock-operatic style.
Houghton moved to the US after touring with this, the only Hooves album, and decided to change direction, addressing mental health issues related to anxiety, also collaborating with other musicians, starting on a comic book series, Butt Hurt, and then a solo album under the name Du Blonde (is this also an entendre?) which is also well worth checking out. Her lyrics are full of restless, clever wordplay:
You walked through her door, and into her senses
And swepted under carpets, in your search for sleep
I see I see amore, when looking through lenses
Cry 'Blind for creation!' like you're blind for me
Ride swift through the houses like blood rides through me
Red wine and whiskey are no good for me
Disecting the atlas for places we've been
Your list is longer but you've got more years on me
A token to dispense, we take it all in doubles
Weeping on concrete, then stealing away
You opened up her mouth, and let out all her secrets
Assumed her disordered in her thirst to stray
Ride swift through the houses like blood rides through me
Red wine and whiskey are no good for me
Dissecting the atlas for places we've been
Your list is longer but you've got more years on me
"And these black berries stain your hands and your lips
Sup on their dimension in the gut of our summer trips
So pray, sleep sweet, and sharpen your teeth
And escape from this body your soul is impounded beneath"
Abort the nonchalance, and clap for your culture
Your tanned hide exerting, the sum of your parts
The bridges will advance, devout of their structure
Armour the estuaries that plow through your heart
Ride swift through the houses like blood rides through me
Red wine and whiskey are no good for me
Disecting the atlas for places we've been
Your list is longer but you've got more years on me.
Lily put your hands in mine, linen wraps around my eyes.
The twisted feet and hooves, the sun ride east.
And then galloped over love, and then galloped right back over me.
Meadows ride of these, seas to your pupils see no reason to dilate in the
Face of me.
Don't ask me to stay.
For my feet won't oblige.
These hooves have had their day.
If I stay I won't survive.
Lily put your hands in mine, linen wraps around my eyes.
A hungry hand I will not stand to feed.
How rootful to absorb the poison of your rhapsody.
A will, a way, in farewell little boy.
For time must not be wasted in gaze of such a lucid Sun.
Oh my love, I'm not done with you yet, oh no.
I might die, without these words having left my mouth.
Oh my love, I'm not done with you yet, oh no.
I might die, without these words having left my mouth.
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