Manchester indie pop artist Abbie Ozard takes us track-by-track through her spectacular coming-of-age debut album ‘everything still worries me,’ a spirited, seductive, and spellbinding fever dream navigating and celebrating young adulthood in all its triumphs and treasures, turbulence and tribulations.
Stream: “everything still worries me” – Abbie Ozard
Few albums in recent memory feel as sonically and emotionally charged as Abbie Ozard’s debut.
“I can’t sit still, my head’s doing roundabouts,” the Mancunian artist sings at the start, dwelling in a space of restlessness, angst, and introspection – and rightly so!
Time is often a doubled-edged sword, and for Ozard – now in her late 20s – there’s plenty for her to get excited about, and just as much to lament. Life hasn’t shaken out exactly as she’d thought or hoped it would (spoiler alert, it never does), and in everything still worries me, the singer/songwriter tackles the good, the bad, the beautiful, and the ugly in a spirited, seductive, and spellbinding indie pop fever dream.
Thirteen delicate and dramatic tracks find Ozard spilling her soul with that charismatic flare and signature charm fans have come to know and love. That inner fire always burning bright, her first full-length album is an achingly intimate, cathartic, and captivating melting pot of raw feelings channeled out through song.
“Your 20s can be a really wild ride,” Ozard tells Atwood Magazine. “Everything changes, the people around you change, your surroundings change, and you’re learning to be a functioning member of society with a backdrop of constant anxiety.”
“This record celebrates every aspect of that, from regrets, relationship realisations, navigating adulthood, and then all the good stuff that comes out of it, like treasuring friendships, sisterhood, and love.”
For the past six years, Ozard has treated a fast-growing fan base to candid reflections on, among other things, her coming-of-age growing pains (which is, quite literally, the name of her 2019 debut EP). Released July 15 via House Anxiety, everything still worries me feels like the apotheosis of these musical ruminations and inner reckonings that have defined her artistry from day one: It’s a natural culmination to what in all likelihood will be an endless soul-search – as we never stop growing and changing, ebbing and flowing. But these songs are, in so many ways, the summation of Ozard’s young adulthood: The trials and tribulations she’s made us privy to across her first three EPs (each one more ambitious than the last) come to life with dynamic energy and resolve as she leans into the friction, the tension, the pain and passion of just being alive and surviving each day.
everything still worries me is an anxious record, and that anxiety arrives in the form of enchanting, confessional lyrics, enthusiastic eruptions, and invigorating, all-consuming choruses that arouse the mind and tickle the ears. It proves the backbone of many of these songs, as Ozard can’t help but compare her present to her past, waxing nostalgic and wondering how long she can cling to the perceived glories of her youth. “Everything has a shelf life,” she sings on the plaintively-titled “i don’t know happiness without you” – a song of mourning, right on the cusp of acceptance. “I never changed when I was 18; now all our friends are having babies. We’ll be fine forever, preserved until whenever. I can hold my head up high and squeeze your hand until we die together.”
Ozard calls her album chaotic, honest, and celebratory.
“I feel like compared to my last EPs, this record feels self-assured, even though there is a lot going on,” she says. “After coming off the back of playing lots of shows I wanted to write an album that felt live, it was important to me that the band was involved and every element of the record was purposeful and meant something.”
The journey from the emotionally heated opening track “the window” to the cinematic finale “think for yourself” is one of considerable personal growth – some of it intentional, some of it more unexpected, but a natural part of growing up and getting older. Ozard is a proven professional when it comes to marrying the catchy and the cathartic, and she does this with effortless ease on every song, all the while tackling these deeper matters of the head and the heart. In addition to both of these bookends, further highlights include the feverish “how are you holding up?,” the dreamy and groovy “miss american dream” (a duet with Liverpool’s Pixey, the entire album’s only featured artist), the radiant and revelrous “monsters,” the hauntingly intimate, shiver-inducing “I miss it when we were just friends,” and the emphatic, enveloping title track.
“‘everything still worries me’ encapsulates what every single track on this record is about,” Ozard explains. “When I first started writing, I wanted to get across so many points that I struggled putting everything into words and I had no idea what it was going to become, but after writing this song along with ‘the window’ and ‘how are you holding up?’ everything just seemed to take shape.”
everything still worries me doesn’t resolve to a space where everything is fixed, fine, and dandy; it’s not all roses, but it’s not all thorns, either. Across her debut album, Ozard captures the sheer complexity of young adult life, channeling her own lived experiences through a digestible array of indie pop anthems, ballads, and in-betweeners that hit hard and leave a lasting mark, both on the ears and on the heart.
“For me, this album helped me navigate my mid-twenties and it taught me that it was okay to not have everything in place and to not know what I’m doing or where I’m going next,” she continues. “I hope it does the same for whoever is listening; there’s an immense amount of pressure riding on you at this age, and it can be the hardest time, but at the same time it can be so much fun. The record represents every part of that.”
“I thought once I’d finished the album everything would seem more clear, but if I’m honest it doesn’t,” she adds. “I’m still figuring it out.”
Experience the full record via our below stream, and peek inside Abbie Ozard’s everything still worries me with Atwood Magazine as she takes us track-by-track through the music and lyrics of her debut album!
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‘everything still worries me’ – Abbie Ozard
:: Inside everything still worries me ::
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the window
Me and Hugo started writing about the window after we were giggling about that scene in Twilight where Bella is staring out the window and listening to that Lykke Li song. We were talking about how going out feels now, compared to how it felt when you were younger and how there was so much possibility and excitement. Now, people have commitments, everything changes, and it often feels tainted and sad. This is my favorite track on the record – it always makes me want to cry when we play it live, just putting that same scenario side by side to how it felt then to how it feels now feels like a punch in the stomach.
how are you holding up?
This is like a p2 from “the window,” I’m waking up from the night before like it was a dream and talking about how everyone always ask how I’m doing or how’s the music going. The track kind of speaks for itself – it was so much fun to record. We just shouted and screamed in the studio for an afternoon, and I came out feeling like huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
anything for you
This track stinks of desperation haha, it’s based around how I tend to change myself to suit others. One of my favorite lyrics from the record ‘I’d give away all my spare parts if it means that I can lie on your heart,’ I feel like for me anyway, it summarises exactly how unrequited love feels.
monsters
Basically an argument in song form, it’s based around how we tend to act in our first relationships, kind of insane. In my first relationship especially, I was literally a Monster and used to do crazy shit. On the other hand though, I do find this track really empowering.
days like these
A fun spin on the subject of doom scrolling! This track was the most collaborative one on the album, my friends did the BV’s with me in my bedroom, we had live strings, Hugo’s girlfriend Daisy played flute, the whole shebang. This song feels kind of country to me. I love it.
i don’t know happiness without you
My sister recently moved away, we’re so close and I struggled with not having her around it for a while. I like to think of this one as an ode to her. Whenever I leave from seeing her, I feel amazing. This is the mood I wanted to put through in the track so I can take it with me and remember how she makes me feel whenever I miss her.
i miss it when we were just friends
This track was a lot of fun to record, Ben and I just vibed all day in his little studio, it all felt really natural. It’s about a change in dynamic me and a friend had because of a drunken night, whoops. I remember telling him that I’d rather be his friend forever than carry on whatever we had going on and never speak to each other again and that really stuck with me throughout the process of writing this song.
night time
I remember walking into Ben’s studio that day and saying I wanted to write a huge anthemic song we could sing live, and everyone would chant the bridge. It’s a dream of mine to hear everyone chant the bridge back. I get kind of annoyed at the narrative we created in this one, she’s frustrating and I want to tell her she’s being pathetic and needs a girls’ night.
party 4 1
Ben and I wrote this in lockdown on Zoom funnily enough, we sat on it for ages and revisited it last year due to my friends saying it was their favourite, it’s now become one of my faves and I’m super gassed to play this one live, it’s so much fun.
miss american dream
I’m a huge fan of Pixey’s so this song was a dream come true for me, she’s super talented. We started off with this idea of having a song called ‘girlhood’ which slowly turned into a big gay song about worshiping another woman. This track means a lot to me and I’m so glad we got to do it together.
space for two
It was a really hot day when we wrote this, and I feel like you can hear it in the song. I always wanted to record something super intimate, with nothing to hide under and with lyrics that were very honest to me. It’s about the first stages of mine and my boyfriend’s relationship where I felt super shy. I think you can tell Elliot Smith was a big inspiration for this track. I love the intimacy of his music and how it feels like you’re right in the room with him, it’s really magical.
everything still worries me
Based on the perspective of someone I knew that was close to me when I was younger. This song encapsulates what every track on this record is about. I realised this after wondering what to call the album and everything seemed to fit into place and make sense. This song is very close to my heart, and I hope others feel that too.
think for yourself
I’ve always wanted a hidden track on an album, this was always going to be that, but after I wrote it we decided it should be a standalone track that finishes the album. Radiohead’s ‘Fitter, Happier’ was a big influence when I wrote this. I always have that stupid TikTok voice around my head if I’ve doom scrolled for too long, the end of the song summarizes how it sounds in my head perfectly and it felt like the perfect way to finish the album.
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