REVIEW: Pylon by Beabadoobee

On September 18, 2026, Filipino-British singer, Beabadoobee (aka Beatrice Laus) released her fourth studio album, Pylon, via Dirty Hit and Interscope Records, following the release of her 2024 recordThis Is How Tomorrow Moves. The project brings together indie rock giants like Paramore’s Hayley Williams, Title Fight’s Shane Moran, Turnstile’s Brandan Yates, Pinegrove’s Evan Stephens Hall, Deftones’ Chino Moreno, and Basement’s Andrew Fisher for collaboration. 

Pylon contrasts Beabadoobee’s last record, trading in her Rick-Rubin-crafted California soft rock for dreary, desolate landscaped grunge, fuzz and distortion. One thing that persists through it all is Beabadoobee’s melancholic, Harriet Wheeler tinged voice. Building upon her palette and love for ‘90s pop and rock, Laus takes her sound in a heavier direction than ever before. 

She explains some of the sonic inspiration behind the record in an interview with Absolute Radio, stating, “I guess I wanted to encapsulate the emotions through the instruments. I was really tapping into a lot of Midwest emo music that I was listening to and I find with this particular genre of music they find dissonant chords that make you feel something… how do you make something make you feel a certain way just by sound?”

The album was predominantly written on the road for the This is How Tomorrow Moves Tour. Laus writes about yearning, longing for home, relationships, confusion and grappling with struggles that come with being in your mid-twenties. The singer-songwriter delves into these issues with simplistic yet affecting lyrics, infectious melodies, and pop hooks.  

The record opens with the song “Pylon,” in which she sings about longing for a loved one on the road and the electric pylons that connect them. Lyrics like “Hold me like a screen/Disconnected from reality” applies a romantic, yet lonely lens to the concept of FaceTiming. The high voltage lines are keeping Laus digitally connected but are unable to satisfy her desire for the all-encompassing experience of in the flesh contact. The track starts gently with a soft string sequence slowly building up and introducing electric guitar riffs until it eventually unleashes the pent-up tension through cathartic layers of guitar, static and crashing drums, establishing the remainder of the record’s alt-rock sound. 

The lead single “Sun has Set,” a heavy Midwest emo track, continues the grungy momentum. Beabadoobee experiments with her voice, pushing it to match the intensity of the instrumentation. Similar angsty vocals can be found on tracks like “In Motion” with lyrics “Got to get away from it/Got to get away from here.”

In the second single “Switchblade,” Laus experiments with sludgy guitar sounds and assorted textures. The lyrics serve as a possible reference to Veruca Salt’s 1994 song “Seether”: “Either, seether/With this anger/Can’t control this fever/That just takes it out of me,” embodying the exhaustion that comes from intense emotion. 

“Write Me a Letter” begins with a gentle, twinkly guitar and drums before eventually escalating into a mall-punk song, conjuring images of 2000s emo haircuts as Laus desperately sings, “Need you to stay, you make me better” over loud, syncopated guitars. 

The album is softened by tracks like “Memories,” a dream pop anthem reminiscent of The Sundays, drenched in bittersweet nostalgia. “Powerlines” comparatively goes darker, bringing forth an atmosphere of moody seduction with reverbed vocals where Laus sings “I miss you” followed by screeching, guitar riffs, grounded with hard hitting drums and Brandan Yates’ raw vocals. 

Glitchy electronic machinery sounding effects show up throughout the track and the record as a whole, painting images of electrical sparks. Beabadoobee said when creating the record, “I just want it to sound like a dying robot”. The industrial sounds makes the project feel more cohesive whilst aligning the record’s thematic imagery of connecting electrical towers.

 “Satellite” concludes and ties the album together by paralleling lyrics from the title track. It revisits the intimacy in calling someone on the phone with lyrics “Hold my breath until the dial tone/Ring, ring, ring/To bring you back to me” and “Orbiting you/Like a satellite.” Laus evokes a sense of dread by acknowledging the heaviness of the current culture and the nuance of tech connection: “The beatniks had their poetry, but what do we know?/Everyday, doom-scrolling like I’ve lost all control/I give the generation a new infatuation/If only I knew how to cope with the times.”

 Featuring backing vocals from Chino Moreno, “Satellite” takes listeners on a sonic journey with an intense crescendo. It ranges from tender acoustics and screamo-esque vocals to a wistful math rock interlude, finally exploding into heavy electric guitar, feedback and distortion that leaves you soaring. 

Beabadoobee embarked on The Powerlines Tour in North America with supporting act Wisp on October 1, 2026. The tour will conclude its North American leg in Seattle on October 29, resume in Europe on November 14, and arrive in Australia in March 2027. Tickets for shows can be found and purchased through Beabadoobee’s website here. Pylon is now available through all major streaming platforms.