After the critical-acclaim Keeley’s albums have garnered (eg. Floating Above Everything Else, reviewed here) their third offering comes laden with a weight of expectation. Even more so as Girl On The Edge Of The World finds Keeley in a state of flux, this being their first album to be recorded with touring members Lukey Foxtrot (bass) and Andrew Paresi (drums), and the first to feature guest vocalists. However, rather than being a hindrance this change has brought a freshness to proceedings and Keeley’s third long player is perhaps the ultimate realisation of their sound, blending indie rock, dream pop, and pastel-shaded psychedelia into a cohesive whole and serves up in a dozen divine tracks.
The changes in the Keeley camp have resulted in a kind of regeneration, rebirth wouldn’t be too strong a word, and indicative of this is the opening couplet ‘Hungry For The Prize’ and ‘Crossing Lands’. The former being a buoyant number that evidences three musicians who are happy in their own company; the guitars shine and shimmer like stars in a crystalline sky, whilst the rhythm section pulls the listener along in its slipstream. The latter is a genre-dodging affair that’s ushered in by an elephantine, post-punk bass rumble and crackles with an amphetamine buzz. What both share (and, indeed, the whole album) is a vibrancy and vitality that professes a sheer belief in this project and gives Keeley a lot of confidence, a feeling that they could shape their sound into any form and they do, shapeshifting and mutating over these twelve songs.
While there’s a forward facing nature to this album, Keeley haven’t torn up their roots and there’s also much that tethers them to the past. The band’s opaque, otherworldly essence is still very much in evidence and cuts such as ‘London Fields’ capture that magic moment somewhere between wake and sleep, and Keeley’s genius lies in taking that moment and seemingly stretching it into an eternity. Girl On The Edge Of The World is once again produced by long term collaborator Alan Maguire, plus the band haven’t lost their fascination with the case of Inga Maria Hauser (but as it’s a story so harrowing, why would you?). Inga was a young backpacker murdered in 1988, and the circumstances surrounding her disappearance continues to haunt much of Keeley’s work, but Inga’s a friendly spectre and a muse who informs nearly all of these songs and that gives the record a unified feel. There’s an overarching theme to the tracks comprising Girl On The Edge Of The World that renders it a concept album; the dreamlike nature of these songs magically transports us back through time to April 1988 and we share both the thrill of Inga’s journey (the first half of the album, The Magic Maze) and the terror (the second portion titled The Tragic Phase).
Girl On The Edge Of The World is an album that will reward repeat plays as subtle nuances buried deep in the mix reveal themselves on successive spins. It also employs tonality in unique ways: it appears as if a great deal of effort has been expended on getting just the right timbre and tone and the notes employed resonate with the listener on a deep, primordial level. True to the album’s theme, Girl On The Edge Of The World takes us on a musical journey, the more perceptive will notice the sound becoming cleaner and less cluttered as the album traverses and reaches its final destination.
Sometime uplifting, at others harrowing, but Girl On The Edge Of The World is a journey you need to take.
- Girl On The Edge Of The World is released via Definitive Gaze on 20th January 2026.
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- KEELEY will embark on a UK tour and will play Coventry’s Tin Arts venue on Thursday 19th February 2026. Tickets available here
Track List:
- Hungry For The Prize
- Crossing Lands
- Trains And Daydreams (featuring Sice)
- London Fields
- London Underground
- Big Brown Eyes (featuring Miki Berenyi)
- Who Wants To See The World
- Girl On The Edge Of The World
- To Bring You Back
- Fell In Love With A Ghost
- The Movie Of Our Yesterdays
- Daydreams And Trains
