Muttering have been a staple of the UK emo scene for a few years now. More crucially, they’ve been a consistent one. Between their brilliant initial offerings, their suitably titled 2022 LP Great and the criminally under-sung collaborative EP they released with Soot Sprite in 2024, Muttering have swiftly become a dotted presence within the post-pandemic UK emo scene. Yet, beyond the cosy confines of said scene, they’re a trio yet to be gifted their flowers. A shame, for they’re more than deserving of such wider praise. But if there’s any justice in the world Love, Keep Me Afraid should see the band being buried under such proverbial banquets.
The second LP from the Brighton / London three-piece, Love, Keep Me Afraid, like most records of this nature, is a record on the nature of love of loss in a world severely lacking in the former and abundant in the latter. But unlike the stereotypical perception held by many regarding records such as these, this isn’t a record of adolescent self-pity expressed by lacklustre men who struggle to both understand and express complex emotions. It’s quite the opposite in fact. Much akin to the work that came before this record, here, Muttering document the complexly bittersweet nature of longing with the kind of matured and sophisticated articulation it demands. The end result is undoubtedly the first great emo-adjacent record of 2026.
A record that shy’s away from the giddiness and woe-is-me-and-me-only angst that has become to define the emo soundscape post-pandemic, the muses on love and loss here are more tender probings of the subject than just messy outpourings of personal misery. It’s this considered and gentle approach that allows this record to truly capture such mercurial emotions in a way that’s tangible to an intimate degree.
The punchy, immediate and grabbing opening gambit of ‘Somehow’, ‘Saturday Afternoon’ and ‘Holding You Back’ encapsulates this sentiment from the get-go, with this trio of tracks not only highlighting Muttering’s driving and inspired approach to the genre, but also the brilliant lyricism of vocalist Charlie Bush. In a way that’s reminiscent of both the band’s fellow scene mates such as the aforementioned Soot Sprite as well as genre pioneers such as American Football, the fashion in which Bush is able to articulate emotions often inexpressible is just brilliant and arresting. It’s a far cry from the juvenility many correlate to this genre.
But what makes this record just so crucial is how this insightfully considered lyricism and approach works in tangent with the record’s progression. Like all greats of the genre, this is a record as shifting as the emotion that drives it. And whilst this may be an album with a two initially different A and B sides so to speak – it’s first half mainly primarily dedicated to the more immediate side of the genre, the latter more bleak and dark – to call it this record of two binary moods would be incorrect.
The elements of the more bouncy and breezy side of emo within tracks such as ‘Sure Of The Season’ and ‘Nothing Buried’ are contrasted brilliantly with the more emotionally spent moments such as ‘Again and Again, I Look For You There’ and the record’s closer. Certain tracks even have this certain quality that’s reminiscent of The Menzingers and The Gaslight Anthem at their most despondent, such as the self-annihilation of ‘Where They Lie’ and the hauntingly beautiful ‘In The General’s Arms’, a song about seeking clarity through conflict that’s one of the record’s most miserable yet best moments.
Throughout all of this though, it’s the sophisticated nature of the record as a whole that just makes this such a compelling listen. Love, Keep Me Afraid isn’t a confused and childish documentation of one’s first foray into the messy nature of love, but a record that’s been shaped by it’s weathering nature in all of it’s unique forms over many years and relationships, romantic and non-romantic alike. It’s this that just makes it so authentic and genuine. The sheer amount of care poured into this record is more or less tangible, and whilst love may be a strange and fickle thing, at least we can thank it for records as evocative as this.