- 2025-12-31
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MUSIC
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Mariel Buckley Releases New Album “Strange Trip Ahead”
Canadian singer-songwriter Mariel Buckley released their third studio album “Strange Trip Ahead” on October 17, 2025.
It marks their first album in three years since the 2022 album “Everywhere I Used to Be”.
The album comprises 9 tracks, which Mariel Buckley recorded with producer Jarrad K in Nashville.
Across nine deeply introspective tracks, they explore the vulnerability of existing in uncertainty - navigating love, loss, and the difficult choices that shape a life.
Mariel Buckley said of the album, “This album has some genre deviations, but the signature ‘sad guy sauce’ remains true. I used to steal my older brother’s CDs in the early 00s — and found myself deep in the alt-rock of that era. In many ways, this record was my gateway drug to indie rock. Grief, loss, liminal spaces — and of course, another song about doing it in the car.”
They continued, “Ultimately, this album is one about choices, and accepting the snack that falls when we push the button. I hope you find yourself somewhere in it. Hang on, buddy - the best is yet to come.”- They added, “It came to me, night-writing in a fourth floor concrete room, 400sq ft all my own, not an inch of it familiar. It found me again in motels and lobbies strewn across the familiar terrain of everywhere and nowhere. It lives with me still, as I hope for movement through and into a great feeling of purpose while the world quite literally falls apart. Fuckin existential stuff, buddy. Though a dark collection in spots, there are prairie wildflowers, growth and tenderness amid these tracks.”
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Mariel Buckley explained some tracks for the album.
“Vending Machines”
“I was genuinely questioning my career, personal life as a result of that career, my distant-feeling relationships with family and friends, and how I could restart after yet another big change.”
“Anvil”
“Anvil explores the decision around having kids — those ‘will we/won’t we’ conversations. As a woman and as a queer person, the scrutiny around that choice is intense. It forces you to look unromantically at what partnership and permanence really mean.”
“Swim Practice”
“When I wrote it, I knew it felt more pop/rock adjacent than anything else. I wanted the verses to feel like holding your breath underwater and the choruses to crash like raging waves. Writing this one was an act of reclamation, taking the story of my first crush and the ensuing adolescent queer shame and repurposing it into something cathartic. I had some bones and a vibe, but Winnipeg beaut CASSIDY MANN really brought it across the finish line. Best enjoyed at top volume, this song might have my favourite chorus on the album and I am very proud of how we wrangled it in the studio. Tentative, sexy and intense.”
“Nashville Now”
“It leans into my issues with self-sabotage, over-indulgence, existential dread and general anxiety about the state of the world.”
- source : Apple Music
