Photo credit: Sam Carter
The Xcerts follow pulsating single ‘Do It to Myself’ with the tender and emotional ‘In Your Eyes’. A song Murray Macleod describes as ‘without question the most raw and personal song we’ve ever written’, it covers both the loss of bassist Jordan Smith’s mother to cancer and the breakdown of a ‘forever love’: ‘The closing lines of the song are ‘this isn’t goodbye, this is I’ll love you forever’ which serves as a full stop but also has an open-ended feel to it. It’s a desperate grieving cry, but while writing the words, I also thought, well, if this is the last thing we ever create then that’s the message I want to ring out in Jordan, Tom and our fan base’ ears.’
Opening with dreamy, restrained atmospherics akin to Bleachers’ calmer moments, Murray pleads ‘kiss my cheek one last time and I’ll live on as the tears that hide’. These powerful thoughts – ‘Just one last look before you leave, I’ll let you go so you can breathe and I will live on’; ‘cancer won’t crush a mother’s love’ – continue amidst the synthy sounds. Gently gliding piano comes in just before anthemic arena Biffy-esque guitar hooks as Murray promises ‘I’ll hold you close, never let go’ and offers the painful, poignant observation that ‘grief bends, I’ll break. Life’s cruel but all I need is you’.
