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A breath of fresh air like Pittsburgh’s own feeble little horse only comes around once in a blue moon. Their 2023 breakout album ‘Girl with Fish’ was a blindingly vibrant mesh of shoegaze, twee pop, indie rock and noise pop. Guitars were blown out into white noise, the leads were dagger sharp. The juxtaposing softness of the vocal performances was a necessity. A trim listen at only 26 minutes, the punch this thing packed made the length acceptable. It’s similar to how a lot of grindcore and powerviolence albums tend to sit firmly in the 15 minute range. Garnering them critical acclaim and a robust little underground following to boot, the world was this very abrupt band’s oyster. Subsequent one-off releases like the mindbending 2025 single “This Is Real” teased an ambitious new direction for the band; its unpredictable structure lent it a surreal impact. Fast forward to late last month, and feeble little horse was dropping their much-anticipated follow-up to ‘Girl with Fish’, ‘Bitknot’.
The brakes have been pumped just a fraction though. Less emphasis is going into filling nearly every nook of space with blissfully bricked-out guitar noise, more attention now gets paid to peppering the tracklist with plush indie pop that is light on the ears, but is also unfortunately light on substance. For every moment here that showcases feeble little horse at their vivid best, there are two others that halt the momentum entirely. In forfeiting their knack for immediately hum-able phrases and enveloping sonic chaos, their music suddenly lacks the necessary serotonin boost that came prior. There is far less desire to return and peel back the fuss in order to find the minor details. Mostly because the runtime is not conducive to letting anything emerge. The deeper problem is that what you hear when you chuck this on is really what you get. It is disappointing considering the direction they obviously blue-balled listeners with on “This Is Real”.
Because even in ‘Bitknot’’s most chipper moments, the playing and vocals can still scarcely conjure up the fucks to give. In approaching this album like this, the band essentially retreats into the colourless background of today’s indie scene. They blend into the beige generality and seem to get sucked into the habits of other bands stuck in this feedback loop. Try to emulate the lo-fi warble and fuzz of DIY artists who paved this very path years prior, and in doing so, simultaneously win over people who are more obsessed with things appearing vintage and nonchalant than actually being quality, and sacrificing any unique traits your band possessed before the point where you decided creativity was boring. While ‘Bitknot’ is by no means bad, feeble little horse sound like shells of their ‘Girl with Fish’ selves, and it’s perplexing to witness this change occur in such a short period of time.
Dan Will Review 