MARIKA HACKMAN’s new album ‘Big Sigh’ is an exercise in catharsis - it’s soul-baring, vulnerable, and melds together all of her previous works to create something with an identity entirely of its own. Check out the latest cover story for our New Music Friday playlist edit, The Cut.

Words: Rebecca Kesteven.
Photos: Steve Gullick.

You’re staring at a blank piece of paper or screen and desperately wishing something creative, cool, or even mildly interesting would pop into your head… but nothing comes. Writer’s block might be one of the most frustrating things to happen to a writer, and there’s nothing quite like emerging out of a lengthy bout of anxious introspection off the back of COVID lockdowns to hammer the nails into that lyrical coffin.

Marking a welcome return to the music stage after a four-year hiatus (minus 2020’s ‘Covers’ - a creative ten-track reimagining of songs from artists from Grimes to Radiohead), Marika Hackman describes her fourth LP ‘Big Sigh’ as the hardest record she has ever made. Written over a two-and-a-half-year period, she compares songwriting to carving a sculpture out of ice, which you slowly chip away at until a song reveals itself - except this time, sitting in her studio in London, it felt like everything had frozen over for good. “It was so much harder to break through like the muscle had been rested, and it just didn’t feel as close to the surface as it had before.”

That was until one night in 2021 in a pub toilet (of all places). Sneaking off to re-listen to a demo she’d recorded earlier that day, the Londoner realised with relief that the writer’s block which had iced over her ability to write songs for so long had finally begun to thaw. “It was mainly the fact that I was even listening back to it - like, sneaking off to go and listen to it - it showed me that I was excited about something that I’d done. The main feeling was just relief; I felt like I’d broken through the writer’s block. It didn’t mean that the rest were all then easy to write; it was just proof to me that I could still do it… which,” she laughs, “is quite an important thing to hold onto.”

That demo would become ‘Hanging’ - a delicate piano-led track about processing the end of a relationship, which crescendos into a roar of grungy guitars. The track mirrors what the album’s themes would also come to be: a clashing of opposites. Using different sonic dynamics, which err on the uncomfortable at times, Marika explores the tensions between loud versus quiet, the industrial inner city versus the pastoral, and childhood versus adulthood - which she ties to having spent so much time over lockdown at her family home in the rural countryside. “I just wanted to play with more organic and pastoral-sounding things while flexing a bit more into an electronic, heavy dynamic. Those two sounds very much represent, to me, the cut-off point from childhood - in the countryside, freedom, lack of responsibility, and feeling nostalgic and wistful about that - combined with my adult, anxiety-laden, clanging capital city kind of life, full of responsibilities.” And for Marika, ‘Big Sigh’ was “really just capturing that in a cinematic, audio way. Because then I felt like lyrically I was really free within those parameters to explore my usual topics.”

Indeed, her 2019 album ‘Any Human Friend’ had seen her enter an era of a proud assertion of sexuality and the power to be found within that. With loud and direct guitar-led instrumentals to match, Marika found her lyrical edge in exploring personal experiences, relationships, and the corporeal - blood, sex, sick, and guts. This thematic thread also weaves itself into ‘Big Sigh’, yet there’s a clear shift towards something more reflective and raw - and we’re “emotionally lurched around” with songs such as ‘No Caffeine’, which throw us into the eye of an anxious storm as she lists ways to help stop a panic attack.

Her words are just as eloquent in conversation as they are in her songs, as she talks about the importance of honesty and not being afraid of vulnerability. “It’s really important to not let vulnerability become a fear. Because, as soon as you start being scared of that kind of stuff, you run the risk of creatively limiting yourself.” There’s a fine line to walk, though - because being so real about your experiences also runs the risk of pulling others into it, Marika explains. “The only thing I don’t ever do is hurt or upset someone or make someone feel like it’s not just me talking about my experiences. I dig into my own personal memories and feelings, and I try very much not to drag other people too heavily into it, to keep it fairly open. That’s the time where I’d check myself.”

But fundamentally, it’s this honesty and the image-laden poetic vignettes about both life’s lightest and darkest moments it creates that make her the songwriter she is. “Being honest is what people connect with, and I think if you get the sentiment really honest, you can then create imagery with the language that’s more poetic.”

‘Big Sigh’ also marks the first time the songwriter has also been credited as primary producer (with additional input from Sam Petts-Davies (Warpaint, Thom Yorke) and Charlie Andrews). “It’s not necessarily something I’ve always wanted to do; it’s something that I’ve kind of been doing without realising… I had no formal training in anything; I’ve just grown into it naturally. I’ve always self-produced whether or not those iterations or songs have ended up on records, so when it came to ‘Big Sigh’, it was just a case of getting the record done and then just working backwards.”

Marika cites the inspiration for her stripped-back production style from the latest Alex G record - “He’s got a real rawness to his music that I think I was also trying to achieve” - as well as the PJ Harvey demos. “It was those more stripped-back elements that were peaking my interest. I don’t like holding onto stuff too much when I’m in the studio; everything’s always quite open-ended, but that was definitely a starting point.”

On top of all this, she also played all the instruments on the record herself (with the exception of the strings). “I demo stuff quite heavily and go very much into arrangement when I’m doing that,” she explains. “So predominantly, there was a lot of just re-recording parts I’d already written, which makes it very plain and simple when you’re in the studio. I do love serendipitous play, but we didn’t do that so much on this record - and I think that’s why it sounds so raw. It was all quite pre-determined, and a part of that is because I’m playing everything.” This rawness is certainly translated, and the songwriter has truly translated herself and what she’s been through directly into song - each track feeling like a window into her mind.

There’s a real sense that a new chapter is beginning with the release of ‘Big Sigh’. “This album is very much more aligned with my earlier work, but it feels like a grown-up iteration of that. It’s a real mark of how I’ve progressed as a human getting older and as a songwriter.” And this sense of development, as well as making sure each release has its own separate identity, is important to her. “I’ve always said I don’t want to make the same record twice. I find the idea of having a fanbase and then being scared that they’re gonna leave you if you shake it up a silly way of thinking. I like to drag people along on a journey with me. It keeps me excited about what I’m doing, which, it sounds selfish, but is ultimately the main thing. I mean, I don’t want to listen to an artist’s work if they’re not excited about it. It’s very important.”

Just as its name might suggest, Marika Hackman’s long-awaited return thus marks a moment of cathartic relief both for her and for her fans. “It’s going to be such a relief when it’s out there. I haven’t been connected to any listeners for such a while. I also feel like once it’s out, I can finally shut the door on it cause that’s the final stage. It’ll get me in a good headspace. ‘Big Sigh’ has taken up my focus, my concentration, my love and my hate for the last four years, and I can’t really put that to one side until it’s out.”

As well as playing a run of record store shows and an EU tour locked in, the experience of writing ‘Big Sigh’ - both its highs and its lows - has simply ignited a desire to write another record. “I’m intrigued to start struggling again, falling in love with something again, and seeing what happens. That’s what’s making me the most excited of all.” ■