Sheffield-based Gia Ford plummets her way into the spotlight on the rock scene as the new, striking indie it-girl to watch.
Gia Ford’s debut album ‘Transparent Things’ follows on with an array of singles, showcasing an exploration of indie strings meeting a bedroom-pop style influence, following on from the 2020 lockdown. Like her previous singles, ‘Transparent Things’ opts to favour the atmospheric acoustic approach to song production that Ford has proved to stay loyal to throughout her discography, so far. However, the debut additionally adapts a further ear for detail as Ford pushes her voice further than ever before, showcasing an increasingly vast vocal range on songs like ‘Housewife Dreams Of America’. Tony Berg, best known for his work amongst artists such as Boygenius and Phoebe Bridgers, worked on the production of ‘Transparent Things’ assisting Ford in bringing all of our Northern-sad-indie girl dreams to life.
Ford also demonstrates herself as suited to St Vincent-esque electric guitar, which appears regularly amongst the album, most notably on the second track, and single, ‘Loveshot’ which completely rejects Ford’s 2022 bedroom-pop-esque sound in return for raw, rock facets, enabling tracks upon ‘Transparent Thing’s’ fit to fill big venues, an achievement undeniably on the horizon for an artist as fresh as Ford.
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‘The Porcupine’ sets out to be a stand-out track amongst the album combining Ford’s acoustic bias with an upbeat folk tune making for a more Americana-style take on her previous acoustic tracks. ‘The Porcupine’ sees Ford tap into her self-proclaimed inspirations of Nick Cave and Fleetwood Mac and tie those influences together particularly prominently.
‘Transparent Things’ also excels in concept as each track tells the tale of a different outcasted character. Themes of downtrodden and dangerous characters prove to be the muse of Ford’s songwriting even outside of the ‘Transparent Things’ tracklist but only to provoke relatability and seek for the listener to recognise familiar facets of themselves within the dark traits appearing amongst the lyrics on ‘Transparent Things’.
The album title ‘Transparent Things’ proves cohesive with its contents; storytelling lyrics that on their surface level fixate the listener before drawing them to see through Ford’s fictional-narrative muses and reflect on their compatibilities with them, all against the back drop of a strong indie-rock soundtrack.
8/10
Words: Lauren Hague
