Mannequin Pussy release I Got Heaven, their anticipated fourth full-length album, today on Epitaph Records. Filled with cathartic tunes about despairing times, I Got Heaven is a document of a band doubling down on their unshakable bond to make something furious, thrilling, and wholly alive.
Over 10 ambitious tracks that abruptly turn from searing punk to inviting pop, the album is deeply concerned with desire, the power in being alone, and how to live in an unfeeling and unkind world. “There’s just so much constantly going on that feels intentionally evil that trying to make something beautiful feels like a radical act,” says Dabice. “The ethos of this band has always been to bring people together.”
By December 2022, the band had 17 new songs written with Congleton in Los Angeles. “Everyone felt empowered to speak up about their own ideas to make this thing the best it could possibly be,” says Regisford. New member Maxine Steen, who has made music with Dabice for years including their side project Rosie Thorne, was especially essential to the writing sessions.
The album opener “I Got Heaven” initially started as one of Steen’s demos. “When she showed it to me I knew it was going to be fun because the verses have this hard-hitting and aggressive approach but the chorus allows for a really soaring melody,” says Dabice. The result is electric. Over walloping guitar riffs, Dabice defiantly yells, “And what if I’m an angel? Oh what if I’m a bore? And what if I was confident would you just hate me more?
The song with its righteous lyrical blending of the sacred and profane is an unapologetic look at Christian hypocrisy. “I don’t think there’s ever been anything in need of a spiritual revolution more than modern-day Christianity,” says Dabice. “It sickens me the way that people use it as a way to do the worst things imaginable, say the worst things imaginable, and pass the worst imaginable legislation that directly harms people.” Instead of judgment, greed, and avarice, the songs on I Got Heaven ask what it really means to genuinely care about the people around you and help your communities in ways you can. “The world that we live in is heaven,” says Dabice. “We live on the most beautiful planet in the solar system, just by a chance and we are continuingly destroying it.”
This sentiment is mirrored by the album’s cover art: a figure and a pig in nature. There’s an intentional ambiguity there that makes you wonder if this person is leading the animal to slaughter or its protector. “We should really be the shepherds and the protectors of everything that we have and the world we live in,” says Dabice. I Got Heaven is an album that understands the stakes of its message: there are countless references to fire, hunger, and holiness. Here, teeth gnash and bodies are temples that ache with desire.
1. I Got Heaven
2. Loud Bark
3. Nothing Like
4. I Don’t Know You
5. Sometimes
6. OK? OK! OK? OK!
7. Tell Me Softly
8. Of Her
9. Aching
10. Split Me Open
Mannequin Pussy – I Got Heaven // Out Now – Epitaph Records
Photo credit – Millicent Hailes