It’s quite ballsy to begin a debut album with the words “You bitch” — but it’s also an epic, attention-grabbing statement that encompasses so many bubbling feelings ready to explode. With GAYLE, it feels just right — a given, even. She isn’t afraid to write exactly what she is feeling in the moment, no matter how bold, rash or heartbroken they may seem, and turns it into a beautifully constructed story, with twists and turns of sweet chaos and rock.
Observing Chaos, out now, is about just that: taking a glimpse into the reckless life of a young woman experiencing life’s drastic highs and lows from ages 17 to 21. At this age, everything feels devastating, and GAYLE channels these feelings in an angelically poetic and guitar-shredding manner to curate a cohesive story detailing the vicious cycle of romance, and its ultimate end.
Through 35 minutes of emotionally swirling sounds, GAYLE lays out the tumultuous (and many) falls of her relationship, detailing every aspect — from regretting and plotting revenge to reminiscing and finding herself right back in the same vulnerable positions as before — and it is her most beautiful and mature project yet.
The Grammy-nominated GAYLE was thrust into the spotlight at just 17 years old with her viral sensation “abcedfu,” which has amassed over a billion streams to date. With the world on her shoulders, the singer-songwriter opened for artists like Tate McRae, AJR, My Chemical Romance and Taylor Swift, impressing audiences across the globe with her iconic split-dye hair and powerhouse vocals.
It’s easy to get cast off as an internet one-hit wonder with a popular TikTok song, but GAYLE has set out with her debut album Observing Chaos to show everyone she is way more than the 2021-dubbed “emo alphabet girl” — she is vulnerable, she makes mistakes and she loves strongly.
“When I looked at my life and picked through all the songs I wrote on and off of tour, I was writing from such an honest place. I realized that in all the best ways, my life was chaos. The album is me honoring and observing it while slowly making sense of it all. And let’s be honest… being a teenager and being in your early twenties is complete CHAOS.” – GAYLE on Observing Chaos.
“You were mine / And now I sit and watch you love her / And I can’t help but wonder / Clementine / Do you remember / When you were mine?”
The album starts off slow with the emotionally-charged “clementine,” where GAYLE sings directly to her ex about all of the post-breakup feelings she’s having. While the guy is now with another girl, GAYLE wonders how much he still thinks of her as her mind drifts back to different intimate moments they had shared. This song sets up the perfect context to continue on into the next tracks, with single “bite the bullet” being the uplifting night out on the town after a breakup full of sadness, where you just want to have mindless fun.
“burn” follows, and it brings the tempo back down, showcasing both GAYLE’s stunning soft-sung lyrics and powerful belting vocals all in less than three minutes. This song feels like an inescapable black cloud. She tried to forget about her pain in the previous track, but she quickly fell back into her feelings once alone again, where all the hurt caused in her previous relationship somehow doesn’t seem that bad anymore — she was in love.
“My mother calls me a forest fire / The flames only getting higher / Each second that I’m yours / So let it burn”
Observing Chaos does a great job at sonically portraying the dramatic rollercoaster a young woman fresh out of a breakup goes through, because when fourth track “clara” starts, it immediately pumps listeners back up. With production that sounds straight out of a 2010s coming-of-age movie, GAYLE sings about a captivating girl she met on a night out who she thought could’ve been the one to get her out of this rut, if she could just get over her fear of opening up again. “clara” is the perfect pop-punk yearning song, with fun vocal moments spread over an addicting guitar riff that’s bound to stay playing in listeners’ heads.
The deep and devastating “arkansas” comes next, which slowly builds as each note continues us along her journey. GAYLE has found herself in a new relationship, one that she might not have been quite ready for. She sings of mundane tasks like making pancakes and getting a passport before the exploding end of their time together, admitting she was 19 and naive — and her partner knew it. The album’s second single “loving you is” ties in with its previous neighboring track well, with GAYLE ripping the idea of love to shreds. This song features some of her greatest, most moving lyrics, such as:
“I feel bad for the next girl / That you beg to stay / I feel bad for the next girl / That’s gonna feel this way”
“mother trucker” is our midpoint to the album, and is where GAYLE’s life flips on its head and she plunges right back into the devastating cycle we started with at the beginning. This song, while sitting at under two minutes, sounds like a first draft demo, with its coated vocals and under-produced instrumental — reminiscent of a casual campfire tune. This is purposeful, however, because the song is simply a vulnerable admittance of still loving someone who you know treated you badly.
GAYLE then lets her ex back into her life with “open arms,” detailing the toxic mindset that love can set someone in. This song has powerful R&B beats coursing through its veins, with her intense vocals swirling around the chorus to create an emotional earworm.
Just as easily as she let him back into her life, GAYLE quickly snapped out of her forgiveness phase and remembered that he actually did screw her over — and it hurt really bad. “just like that” is a standout song on the album, between its crafty production build-ups in each verse, and its sonic and vocal explosion in the choruses. As she screams “I was there” over and over throughout the song’s post-choruses and bridge, it’s clear she is full of resentment; He cheated on her and thought she wouldn’t notice.
“You were my first / And you got off on that / You taught me some things / That you shouldn’t have / But I’ll put them to use / But just not with you / And I wont feel bad / I’ll do it just like that”
Lead single “junebug” is reminiscent of earlier track “bite the bullet” with its catchy, rock-infused party roots — which only furthers the narrative that the entire album is a cycle. While these songs and feelings can be related back to and compared to one another within the album, they are never felt exactly the same, whether that’s a proof of growth or tiredness.
GAYLE sings “I’m never gonna love anybody like you” throughout the chorus of next track “anybody like you,” which explores relapsing into her ex once more. She has found a way to trick herself into thinking a different (or better) love will never find her, so why wouldn’t she go back to something familiar? “rot,” however, is where GAYLE realizes what she is remembering is a false reality, and returning to isn’t actually true love.
“Now you’re pouring out the urn / of the lovers that you burn / Wish the fires that you started / Weren’t so half hearted”
Observing Chaos ends with “this is what you asked for,” a nearly 2-minute scolding directly to the ex. The song gets intense and orchestral as she emotionally sings “don’t look at me that way, this is what you’ve asked for.” It ends on an abrupt piano note, with GAYLE saying she didn’t ask for any of this pain to happen to either of them. This song being the album’s closer, while likely not the final nail on the coffin of the cycle, was a brilliant choice, because it leaves listeners with a sense of closure from our narrator. “this is what you asked for” is the first time we hear GAYLE say out loud she is going to walk away from him, and find better for herself.
Photo Credit: Acacia Evans
As all cycles go, they loop and loop until we lose ourselves in the process. When you throw love and heartbreak in the equation, it feels even more like a never-ending entrapment. GAYLE masters every emotion perfectly throughout Observing Chaos, highlighting each mundane task, intense emotion and irrational action a heartbroken girl feels and does when the love of her life throws it all away.
GAYLE isn’t new to the music industry, in fact she’s been in the public eye for at least half a decade, which is why it’s shocking her debut album is only coming out now. While many artists would rush out a body of work at the first glimpse of fame, GAYLE took her time, making countless songs until she found what was right for her to release, and it was certainly worth the wait.
Observing Chaos is about love, but it’s also about hatred and friendship and self-awareness and maturity and womanhood. The album is a perfect (and a must-listen) guide for a woman in her formative years — because life is certainly chaotic, and that deserves some praise.
Keep up with GAYLE:
Instagram / Website / Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube
