Indie-folk artist Lizzy McAlpine released her fifth album Angel on Sept. 18, 2026, and yes, it is possible for her to release relatively happy music — this album (somewhat) proves it! I’ve listened to it at least six times since it was released, and for those who might want to get a read on the album before listening, or for those who are just as fixated on it as I currently am, these are my favorite lyrics and short, atmospheric summaries of each song.
“The light in the painting”
“You are the light in the painting / that my eye is drawn to first”
Somehow, McAlpine makes a song with lyrics that read as the most beautiful, uplifting love poem sound like devastation. This was her single released from the album, and it was a perfect choice to set the tone for what’s to come.
“Anybody’s fool”
“Want you to want me to want to change / I like the way it feels to not be / Anybody’s fool”
The simple repetitive piano chords and almost ballad-y lyrics reflect the relief buried in the sadness at the end of a relationship. You are no longer attached to someone else or the implication of their actions, though you may also be left wanting to go back to the beginning of the relationship when everything seemed easier. Unfortunately, you’ve both gone through too much to ever be naive enough to feel that way about the same person again.
“A car wash and a new pair of pants”
“You wanted my life to be yours / So she is the woman you needed / Now that I am not you anymore”
It seems like McAlpine pulled from her 2025 Broadway debut in Floyd Collins. A folky, “cyclical” accompaniment that keeps pulling the listener in, physically and audibly, the same way McAlpine seems to have been pulled in again, again, and again by whoever wanted and used her for her fame. He cheated on her with her fame. She asks the age-old question of many ex-girlfriends: “Who was I with? Where was his soul, his conscience?”
“I have a friend”
“I have a lover / Nobody knows just how deep / There is a magic in all of the secrets we keep”
Oh, to have a partner who truly likes you. Most would argue that it’s equally as important — or more important — to like someone while knowing you love them rather than just loving them. How lovely to have someone who sees you as your own person, and appreciates those traits of yours, rather than appreciating you as an extension of themselves. It comes with ease, it comes with comfort and that melty, floaty feeling that doesn’t have a particular name but is perfectly captured by McAlpine here.
“The moon”
“But with just one kiss / I am down on my knees / Saying, ‘How do you do this to me?’”
My favorite. Of any of these songs — any of her songs in general, really — this one makes me miss the acoustic guitar I left at home (I can’t wait until I have it back, when I can sit on the floor of my dorm with it in my lap and learn to play this song). “I am only as strong as one girl can be…” And Lizzy, aren’t we all. As much as I and many other modern young women often love to reject the “handsome prince and maiden fair” trope, I do sometimes think it might be cozy to find something like that, as does McAlpine. It’s like if a guilty pleasure was a person — we want to resist only to prove to ourselves that we have the self control, or at least the ability of resistance. But, sometimes it’s just too good and too worth it, especially in that “giving in” moment she depicts.
“Ugly things”
“Hiding your sweatshirt on the top shelf / Watching you walk around with someone else”
The drifting, the strange gray area of loving. Of not wanting to let go, but feeling guilty that you still put yourself through the “ugliness” that you’re seeing. “I’m sorry” echoes throughout the track: apologies to herself, to the one she sings about and scorns for that ugliness, and to anyone else she may hurt in the process of being hurt. I’d also like to point out the use of “pushing it down” in the final chorus. Is it possible she’s … “pushing it down and praying” again?
“Soldier of the road (feat. Fleet Foxes)”
“They never let you out and the road gets longer / We hold each other tight / I need to touch the earth, I need the sky”
I feel this track is very reminiscent of Hadestown. The metaphor of being another cog in the system: overworked, underappreciated. If Eva Noblezada ever covered this, it could absolutely pass as a cut Eurydice ballad. The singer is tired and looking for relief in love — which doesn’t seem to come to McAlpine often, and she makes sure we don’t forget it — only to realize the impossibility of finding solace in those working conditions.
“Peach”
“I stand in the kitchen, one step closer to myself / Somewhere in Kentucky / You play a song for someone else”
Did McAlpine crack the long-distance code? Long distance relationships are no walk in the park (like many, I’ve been there, done that), especially not when the progression of your life is measured by someone else’s. It’s about growing more as people, not growing apart from one another. One partner takes a breath and stands still while the other jumps forward, yet it’s progress on both ends.
“Over country”
“Over lovers, over other hands on other waists / Someone loves me over something that will never change”
I’d like to think this is the antithesis to “Over an Ocean Call,” and it’s about a different kind of love — the love of a long distance best friend (shoutout to mine). The home that you find in a true friend is the love that will chase and catch up to you each time, a love that outlasts change.
“Two elevens”
“Took the picture I still look at / Just to feel what I know / There was love once / There was fire”
This song was the one that hit me hardest. I’m the friend who will always point out and make a wish at 11:11, and it seems McAlpine is too. 1111 is the angel number for awakening and manifestation, but is she regretting what she wished for? These wishes are usually for future progress, so had she out-progressed her lover?
“Our strange ways”
“Hard to imagine / From the other side of it all / From the starting line / I thought I would stay with him my whole life”
How do we start over? How much can we let go of before we lose ourselves because we only know who we used to be with them? About five minutes into the song, water rushes into the audio: does she feel like a watered down version of herself now that she lost the one that made her feel whole?
Lizzy comes back after you think the song is over, playing piano and the final verse of the song: “Looking glass to the sun / Burst into flames / You set me on fire / I remember everything.” We can keep coming back to that old version of ourselves, but it will never fit us the same.
“Mason’s song”
“Sometimes I still don’t know if they’re right or they’re wrong / But I know I will find it if you play along”
Most likely dedicated to Mason Stoops — one of McAlpine’s musical collaborators — this track is about fighting like siblings while working like partners. He knows how to read her and untangle her mind. She needs his help, and he seems to know how to give it.
“The crowd”
“Everything I do / I make it big so you can hear the crowd”
McAlpine reflects on only getting childhood memories of her father through the memories of her mom and sibling because she has so few of her own. Her father passed away suddenly in 2020, and since then, McAlpine has dedicated the thirteenth track of each album to him. I would argue that it is the most tear-jerking song on the album, the most raw. I don’t feel this one in my gut like the others, this one is so simple that the melancholy hits you straight in the heart.
“Angel”
“Couldn’t have seen you clearer / Until I saw you then / Losing myself in someone / Opening up again”
Star crossed lovers? A mythical kind of love? Someone she thought might be a figment of her imagination? It’s hard to make love a waiting game, but that reunion of a long distance couple — finally getting to view them, to experience them, to physically be with them — seems to make it all worth it for McAlpine.