{"id":2025337,"date":"2026-07-03T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T21:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2025337"},"modified":"2026-07-03T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T21:00:00","slug":"wonderland-255","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2025337","title":{"rendered":"Wonderland"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\tWonderland<\/span>
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\n\t\t\tMARY IN THE JUNKYARD ARE DREAMING OUT LOUD<\/span>
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Somewhere between \u201cDeptford Beach\u201d and a cave full of candles, mary in the junkyard\u2019s debut album finds reality continually creeping into the phantasmagoric.<\/h3>\n
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Photography by Emily Henman<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

On one of the hottest afternoons of the year, the terrace outside mary in the junkyard\u2019s neighbouring Deptford flats feels akin to the opening scene of a play. Two front doors sit neatly beside one another, periodically swinging open as another member of the band emerges, muses on an outfit choice and disappears again. Somewhere inside, flutes and violins drift through open windows. Frontwoman Clari Freeman-Taylor appears carrying a handful of little plastic mice she bought on Amazon because she thought they were cute. They are technically cat toys and make a faint rustling noise when shaken. I am handed a white one, whilst photographer Emily receives a brown one. We both pocket them without question. A few moments later, she\u2019s gone again.<\/p>\n

Spend enough time with mary in the junkyard, and it becomes increasingly difficult to tell where one person\u2019s imagination ends and another\u2019s begins.<\/p>\n

Eventually, Freeman-Taylor, bassist and multi-instrumentalist Saya Barbaglia, and drummer David Addison gather together and lead us towards what they call \u201cDeptford Beach\u201d. I quickly discover this is a somewhat over-romanticised name for a patch of land beside the Thames. With the tide in, it is essentially a flooded staircase.<\/p>\n

Their debut album, Role Model Hermit<\/em>, arrives on 3rd July via AMF Records after years of growing momentum. Since releasing their Richard Russell-produced debut EP \u201cThis Old House\u201d in May of 2024, the trio have followed their instincts wherever they lead, whether that means a music video featuring a love story with a yeti<\/a>, road-testing new material before fully deciphering it, or writing songs populated by reincarnated mice and ancient folk tales. Everything they do, however, remains deeply human: friendship and vulnerability, and the tension between wanting to be seen and wanting to disappear.<\/p>\n

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As we sit down at a nearby pub, Addison orders a bitter. Barbaglia requests peppermint tea. Freeman-Taylor simply asks for \u201canything in a fancy looking glass.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe title\u2019s from an astrological term,\u201d Freeman-Taylor explains of Role Model Hermit<\/em>. \u201cWhen you\u2019re recording it, you\u2019re a hermit. And then when you\u2019re playing it, you\u2019re a role model.\u201d<\/p>\n

She pauses.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes I\u2019m like, \u2018Look at me, I\u2019m singing!\u2019 And sometimes I\u2019m like, \u2018Stop looking! Go away!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt felt like an album quite early on,\u201d says Barbaglia. \u201cThere was momentum and we were ready to let it all out.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a really good period of writing quite intensely in January last year,\u201d Addison recalls. \u201cWe got demos of \u201cCrash Landing\u201d, \u201cMouse\u201d, and \u201cThou Shalt Sprout\u201d. At one point, we were going to call the album Mouse<\/em>, because that song just felt like such a step up for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the singles come out, it gives me a flashback to when we were recording or writing them,\u201d he continues. \u201cFor us, it all happened last summer. But when people start interacting with them, they feel fresh again.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Written largely during festival season, Role Model Hermit<\/em> emerged from a haze of exhilaration and exhaustion. \u201cIt was the week before Glastonbury<\/a>,\u201d Freeman-Taylor remembers. \u201cThen it was the week after, and we were all coming down. I passed out on the sofa in the studio the next day.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it helps you to be exhausted sometimes,\u201d says Barbaglia. \u201cAt that moment, you don\u2019t care as much.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when the brain is throwing out some of the craziest stuff,\u201d Addison adds. \u201cHopefully the album sounds a bit like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Freeman-Taylor speaks so quietly throughout our conversation that I occasionally find myself leaning forward to catch her answers. Barbaglia, meanwhile, is in almost constant motion, cycling through ballet poses and impromptu MMA moves as we stop to take photographs. Addison has spent his life enthusiastically falling down musical rabbit holes, discussing songs and cultural histories with the enthusiasm of both musician and journalist as we discuss his new music blog, Buzz Or Howl.<\/p>\n

Despite their differences, they move through conversation like people who have spent years existing in the same imaginary world. \u201cOur non-verbal connection is more important and more strong than our verbal connection,\u201d Freeman-Taylor says. \u201cWhen you\u2019re in the band, you have to let go of yourself,\u201d Barbaglia adds. \u201cLet\u2019s say there\u2019s a take where I know I didn\u2019t play my best \u2014 as a band, it\u2019s the energy of what it becomes that\u2019s more important than individual performance.\u201d<\/p>\n

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That spirit of experimentation manifests in even the smallest details, like Barbaglia\u2019s hand made instruments that appear on the record. Perhaps one of the most unique musical inventions featured is a skateboard slide guitar, played with a peri peri sauce bottle to create some of the stranger, high-pitched tones heard. \u201cWe\u2019re all percolators of everything that we experience and see,\u201d says Freeman-Taylor. \u201cAnd we see a lot of music!\u201d<\/p>\n

Songs emerge through similarly unconventional means. \u201cMantra III\u201d, the album\u2019s hypnotic opener, began as an improvisation in the band\u2019s Lewisham rehearsal space.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cWe would just play \u201cMantra III\u201d as a sort of warm up,\u201d says Addison. \u201cTo lock in with each other and feel connected.\u201d<\/p>\n

That same feeling of connection and trust in each other extends far beyond the rehearsal room. On their first trip to New York, where they opened for Wet Leg, they arrived with nowhere to stay and no real plan at all. \u201cI had a sense of belief that we would find somewhere,\u201d Barbaglia says simply.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything is fun when we do it together,\u201d Freeman-Taylor says. \u201cWe really have each other\u2019s backs, we can handle anything.\u201d<\/p>\n

By this point, songs about reincarnated mice and ancient folk tales no longer feel particularly surprising.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there\u2019s just a lot to say that\u2019s not about me and my family and relationships,\u201d Freeman-Taylor says.<\/p>\n

Discussing album highlight \u201cThou Shalt Sprout\u201d, she recalls attending local folk sessions, singing in two-part harmony and telling old stories. \u201cIt felt like it already existed, and I was just discovering it,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s actually easy to write in rhyme. The words already have links between them, and so they just fall out.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Even Addison\u2019s own interests seem to gravitate towards similar territory. At university, he wrote his dissertation on Gerrard Winstanley, a seventeenth-century mystic who retold religious stories as psychedelic folk tales about community and living off the land.<\/p>\n

Reality continually creeps into the phantasmagoric.<\/p>\n

The album\u2019s world feels much larger than the three people sitting around the table. It is also the point at which mary in the junkyard\u2019s sound seems to fully open out. Throughout Role Model Hermit<\/em>, hushed mantras and mazy strings sit alongside distortion and moments of almost orchestral intensity, with an increasing attention to texture and atmosphere. On \u201cCrash Landing\u201d, for instance, the wheezing harmonium and its audible creaks, left deliberately unpolished according to Addison, add a droning, tactile quality to its sound. Even standout \u201cNew Muscles\u201d, with its low-slung bassline, defiant yet murmured vocals and trip-hop pulse, ought to feel like a left turn, but instead feels almost like another room opening up in the same house. Every peculiar quirk still sounds unmistakably mary in the junkyard.<\/p>\n

Throughout the afternoon, friends and collaborators surface repeatedly in conversation, but one name appears more than any other: Daisy Ayscough. A close friend and creative collaborator, her fingerprints are all over the album\u2019s visual world, from its cover artwork and videos to its merch and social media presence.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cDaisy\u2019s a really big, important part of the album,\u201d Barbaglia affirms. And by this point, her name has surfaced so often that she almost feels like a fourth member sitting at the table.<\/p>\n

For a record titled Role Model Hermit<\/em>, there is very little isolation here. What lingers instead is its whole-hearted sense of community.<\/p>\n

As our time together draws to an end, I wonder what someone would see if they could physically step inside the world of Role Model Hermit<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Freeman-Taylor doesn\u2019t hesitate.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re in a cave, and it has loads of rugs and candles inside it. Outside, there\u2019s an ocean and shadows of boats. It\u2019s raining slightly, but there\u2019s a really bright ray of light cutting through the clouds. There are shadowy figures on a nearby island, fairy creatures and little fireflies flying around.\u201d<\/p>\n

By now, it doesn\u2019t feel especially surreal. Role Model Hermit<\/em> may be populated by caves, fairy creatures and reincarnated mice, but its real magic lies in the belief that the most ordinary places can be extraordinary, provided you have the right people beside you.<\/p>\n

Listen to the album\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

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Words \u2013 Hannah Breen<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t3 July 2026\t\t\t<\/div>\n
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Feature Interview<\/a><\/div>\n
Music<\/a><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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\n\t\t\t\tAll Points East Presents Outbreak Adds Kenny Mason, Tooth & More<\/span> <\/span><\/a>\t\t\t<\/div>\n
\n\t\t\t\tWho Doesn\u2019t Want To Work With Robbie Blue?<\/span> <\/span><\/a>\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wonderland MARY IN THE JUNKYARD ARE DREAMING OUT LOUD Somewhere between \u201cDeptford Beach\u201d and a cave full of candles, mary in the junkyard\u2019s debut album finds reality continually creeping into the phantasmagoric. Photography by Emily Henman On one of the hottest afternoons of the year, the terrace outside mary in the junkyard\u2019s neighbouring Deptford flats […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,257],"class_list":["post-2025337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-wonderlandmagazine-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2025337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2025337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2025337\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2025337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2025337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2025337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}