Lucia & The Best Boys – Picking Petals

Glasgow indie pop stalwarts Lucia & The Best Boys are one of the country’s most doggedly determined bands. Their leader, Lucia Fairfull, has been unafraid to shapeshift over the last nine years as a songwriter and high-end fashion model, working with the likes of Alexander McQueen. Equal measures of self-reckoning, vulnerability and fearlessness have been the catalyst to her artistic growth, while her trademark visceral live performances have also seen her and her Best Boys (Ally Scott, Adam Campbell and Christopher Ballantyne) transcend from their hometown’s smallest venues to its arguable pinnacle – the iconic Barrowland Ballroom – later this year on Friday 23 October.

The band’s second album Picking Petals stands as a testament to this rise. The neatly crafted baroque-pop of Big Romance, featuring their close friend Abigail Morris of The Last Dinner Party, sets the record’s bold tone. Its accompanying video may show the pair dressed all in black, embodying the song’s longing lyrics, but with such bright intertwining melodies, it’s no surprise they’re dancing in tandem towards its conclusion.

Pairing this with the fist-bumping album opener Back Inside My Heart and the compellingly catchy lead single Lonely Girl featuring CHVRCHES’ Lauren Mayberry, you get the sense that Picking Petals is unified by the band’s resilient ethos. Not only that, the latter track also encapsulates Fairfull and Mayberry’s uncompromising stance on being seen as Scottish women in music: 'They say you'll need to move away to live your dreams / Beside the stars and you'll go far, or so it seems / But I'll dip my toes in water when I need that clarity / Where I thrive is where I am, yeah, I don't need to leave.'

With such lyrics in mind, a spirit of home also permeates across Picking Petals. The band found solace writing in bothies in the north of Scotland while making the album, resulting in trad flavoured moments like You Look Like Somebody In Love and the title track’s lyrical imagery using a wilting thistle as a metaphor for growth and transformation. Other highlights such as the lilting Ephemeral channel essences of The Cranberries, while Forgot the Arrow’s tenderly minimal arrangement gives space for Fairfull’s vocals to come to the fore in their full-bodied grace.

Stepping up from their debut by fusing their vibrant live energy with ample room for introspection, Picking Petals sees Lucia & The Best Boys flourish.

Listen to: Big Romance (feat. Abigail Morris), Lonely Girl (feat. Lauren Mayberry)