Beabadoobee - This is How The World Moves

by Zena Grieg

published: 1 / 2 / 2025

Beabadoobee - This is How The World Moves

Label: Dirty Hits
Format: CD

Self-assured third album from London-based indie rock musician and recent Taylor Swift support Beabadoobee

Review

Philippines-born, London-based singer-songwriter Beabadoobee (real name Beatrice Kristi Ilejay Laus) received widespread critical acclaim with her first album, the 2020 ‘Fake It Flowers’. Following the release of her second album ‘Beatopia’ Beabadoobee performed as an opening act on Taylor Swift’s Era’s Tour. Hew new, third album ‘This Is How Tomorrow Moves’, produced by famed rock and rap producer Rick Rubin at his Shangri-La studio in Malibu, is more reflective than her previous songs. It evidences a welcome expansion of Beabadoobee’s range, the new record a mix of rock and gentle ballads, incorporating elements of jazz and folk alongside her distinctive indie-rock style, the lyrics refreshingly direct: “… this time I had more trust in my actual song writing. I almost went back to like, ‘What did I do at 17 when I wrote Coffee?’ I wasn’t overthinking about anything.” Songs to listen out for in this fourteen-track collection include: the catchy opener and lead single ‘Take A Bite’; the rock ‘California’ with its lyrics of disaffection: “Now you’re stuck in the past, I’m tired of living so fast/…Keeping it quiet ‘til I hit back/And I know they won’t listen ‘til I start to crack/And I pick up the pieces of what they left”; ‘One Time’, an address to a former lover, with its spirited guitar solo; the carefully arranged, emotive ‘Tie My Shoes’, highlighting the singer’s melodic vocals; stripped-back, plaintive piano-led ballad ‘Girl Song’, to her own younger self; the playful guitar waltz of ‘Coming Home’, about missing loved ones on tour; evocative country-pop ‘Ever Seen’ with its insinuating refrain; the rhythmic rock ‘Beaches’; ‘The Man Who Left Too Soon’: with its captivating lines: “But we both looked at the sky and thought/”At least we look at the same moon?... I wish I met the man who had left too soon”; and the plaintive closer ‘This Is How It Went’, about moving on from a relationship. With its diverse range of styles and sounds, ‘This Is How Tomorrow Moves’ is an auspicious next step for this enterprising musician

Track Listing:-

1 Take A Bite
2 California
3 One Time
4 Real Man
5 Tie My Shoes
6 Girl Song
7 Coming Home
8 Ever Seen
9 A Cruel Affair
10 Post
11 Beaches
12 Everything I Want
13 The Man Who Left Too Soon
14 This Is How It Went