Billy Nomates Takes a Giant Leap on Her Second Album, 'Cacti'

Still rooted in post-punk, Cacti flows with more melody and observational lyrics.

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Walking into the party on someone’s sophomore album doesn’t always paint a clear picture of what they’re about. In this case, we’re talking about Cacti, the fantastic new album from Billy Nomates.

My only notion of Billy Nomates, the name that Bristol’s Tor Maries performs under, was a feature on Sleaford Mods’ “Mork n Mindy” - from my discussion with friends, I’m not the only one. A lot of the early press for Cacti mentions Maries coming from a post-punk scene that features the East Midlands sneer of Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williamson and Australia’s Amyl and the Sniffers. But upon hearing Cacti's first single, “blue bones (death wish),” I wasn’t quite sure how a slick run at mid-90s alternative fit in with the brainy bawdiness of acts like Sleaford Mods.

A quick trip back to Nomates’ self-titled debut from 2020 caught me up quickly. Over drum machines and raw bass, Maries quips about inequality and the folly of a dead-end corporate job in the new decade. Released in the summer of lockdowns, it’s a message that is just a bit ahead of its time and most certainly deserves a wider audience. The album is one of those raw introductions that immediately lets you know there’s more to come, so much so that Portishead’s Geoff Barrow had Maries release the record on his label (as is Cacti).

Now with the previous record for reference, the growth on Cacti is immediately ear-catching. Thanks to Maries’ middle-class upbringing and her experiences of trying to fit into an office setting while yearning for a more creative outlet, she is poised to explode onto the scene with a rooted base that’s often lacking in an industry built upon backroom handshakes of connected parents who have come before.

It makes Cacti an exceptional record in which Maries tackles subjects like a privileged music industry and navigating late-stage capitalism (she recently told NME, “I’m a woman in the modern world, of course I’m angry!”). Late album highlight “apathy is wild” checks in on a world two years after that self-titled debut with Maries singing:

“The death of everything real has happened

Where do you sit in the new world now?

The jokes that you tell they swing but no one is laughing

But you can hold a room every once in a while

Apathy is wild

Blow your brains out

Inner dying child

You don't say now.”

Cacti also expertly navigates romantic relationships, as Maries refuses to give in to played-out norms. Instead, she spins excellent breakup yarns full of regret like “black curtains in the bag” or “blue bones (death wish)” when Maries has no time for games and memorably sings, “but death don’t turn me on like it used to.” It all pays off on “spite,” in which Maries lights a match and declares, “little boy, don’t think you quite understand, don’t you act like I ain’t the fuckin’ man, I’m only here, I’m only here cos I can,” while walking away from an explosion fit for a Michael Bay movie.

Not only have Maries lyrics matured, but so has the music. Cacti still revolves around the slinky bass and drum machines of her debut, but now the keyboard synths and guitar textures are given more room to breathe. Maries once again recorded most of the album at home, but teaming up with co-producer James Trevascus, who has worked with fellow badass women like PJ Harvey, pays off with a more expansive, warmer scope this time around.

With all the elementary pop we’re force-fed, Billy Nomates is a breath of fresh air. She’s someone I can see playing to colossal festival audiences this coming summer while being uniquely in tune with the hardship of working-class struggles. I never know whether someone will take off stateside, but there’s no doubt Maries will have quite the deserved audience in her native England and beyond.

Cacti is available now on Invada Records UK.