Billy Nomates: Cacti review – heroic takedowns and tunes to burn

Billy Nomates’s eponymous first album (2020) and subsequent EP, Emergency Telephone (2021), introduced a singular new talent. Based in Bristol and fiercely independent, this caustic solo singer-songwriter, born Tor Maries, came at most subjects – from positivity to high heels to charity muggers – from oblique angles, her sometimes sung, often spoken delivery full of original phrasing.

Best described as a punk with a keyboard and tunes to burn, Nomates has dug even deeper for Cacti, her songwriting broadening its reach. Her deadpan takedowns remain heroic. “Don’t you act like I ain’t the fucking man,” she bristles on Spite, a song about coming to a party to spoil someone’s fun. But there’s a sadness to tracks such as Fawner that threatens to spill over into country and western, and a honky-tonk piano is the unexpected element on Same Gun.

Although they are quite different artists, Billy Nomates shares with Self Esteem – similarly undersung a couple of years ago – the ability to restate the absurdities of what we do to ourselves and each other with laser precision and a raised eyebrow. “Does it frighten you that I’m still driving?” she asks on Balance Is Gone, a snappy post-punk banger that staggers around, trying to find a foothold in the crazy paving of the past few years.