Mammoth: Flora Hibberd reaches for a bigger sound

Mammoth is Flora Hibberd's second album, and the first where her writing sounds like it might leap off the page. The arrangements are bigger: horns, gated drums, glittery synths. The record wants to be more than a soft-focus folk album, and it gets there in patches.

Hibberd arrived with the Archipelago EP in 2020, followed it with Hold in 2021 and released her debut full-length Swirl in 2025. On those records the melodies sat back and her writing rarely took the lead. Mammoth is her attempt to put more spark into the music, and the difference is in the arrangements.

She made it with producer Ben Lanz, whose credits include work with The National and Beirut. It came out on 16 October 2026. Sufjan Stevens sings on 'Perfect Ripple'. The record moves between softly lined indie-folk and light-touch Americana, with energised synth-pop excursions along the way, and Hibberd's soft grain stays at the center. The title track sets the terms.

It rides a galloping rhythm and a horn line that suggests something restrained, then holds back. 'Ache' is better: booming but gentle, glittery synths over gated drums and soft backing vocals, a lyric about wanting to see a person past the facades they build. The warm instrumentation keeps the folk base in view even when the drums gate and the synths glitter. The husky coo in the vocal is the record's best instrument.

'Silent Movie Baby' is the standout: the yearning goes to desperate places and the arrangement follows, animated and restless. 'Shelley' calls on the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley for creative help, over calming pedal steel and a melodic cadence that keeps the plea light. The cadence is tasteful, which makes the plea feel offhand. It is the one song where the softness feels chosen.

'Perfect Ripple' is a wandering reflection on creativity, with bleeping synths and Sufjan Stevens' husky coo. Then the electronics take over the outro and the song opens up. The synth line is a small pleasure. 'Mythic Figure' has sharp percussion that carries the chorus to a bigger finish, but the vocal struggles to meet the grand conclusion. That gap between arrangement and voice runs through the record.

'Deltaplane' and 'Dew Pond' are the weak points. Both lean on polished-over textures, and the polish does the work the songs should do. 'Deltaplane' is the longest cut here, and its texture never turns into an event. 'Dew Pond' has the same problem, a soft surface with nothing pressing underneath. On a record that wants a bigger sound, safe is the wrong risk.

This is for listeners who keep Swirl and the Archipelago EP close, and for anyone who wants the hush of Sufjan Stevens and the soft-focus Americana of The National and Beirut in the same frame. It will not convert anyone who wants Hibberd to raise her voice. Mammoth is a 3.5: a record that reaches for a bigger sound and often finds it, then settles for polish when the song needs a shove. The title track asks the question that stays: 'Why flee the feeling? / Does she not give her love?'

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