Although Mac DeMarco does not portray much differentiation within his music, it never seems to get old. Guitar is no different. With mellow bass lines that walk hand in hand with acoustic guitars. It seems that with a lot of Mac DeMarco songs, every instrument has a place and a purpose in the tracks.
‘Shining’ sets off the album in a very repetitive way with that classic Mac Demarco homemade sound of an acoustic guitar and chilled out, sleepy drums. The track itself makes DeMarco reach into the higher end of his vocal range as the lyrics explore the complexities of love and relationship struggle and you can hear this follow through into the next track ‘Sweeter’.
At a bitesize 1 minute and 50 seconds, ‘Phantom’ throws all the positive connotated song titles 180 degrees to more dark, negative titles such as ‘Nightmare’ and ‘Terror’. Although throughout the whole album every song sounds the same and there is barely any differentiation between tracks instrumentally, it doesn’t drag the album out in the slightest. The instruments in ‘Nightmare’ make a very unsettling yet cool vibe with instruments that sound a tad out of tune and it almost reels you into the song if your mind has drifted.
I cannot wait to see the influx of photo dumps on social media soundtracked by this album, as more often or not Mac DeMarco’s music accompanies scenic pictures of the Italian countryside which do most definitely go hand in hand. Lyrically, like a lot of DeMarco’s music the words carry the album as the way he writes is on another level. If I were to narrow my favourites down a high contender would be ‘Nightmare’ and ‘Rock and Roll’. However, I do wonder if Mac DeMarco ever gets bored making every album sound almost like a copy of each other.
Mac DeMarco: Guitar – Out 22 August 2025 (Mac’s Record Label)
