Natalie McCool lets the shadows in on ‘So Lonely, Lonely’

Natalie McCool has been making the wait for Good For The Soul increasingly difficult, and ‘So Lonely, Lonely’ might be the biggest tease yet. Where ‘Coming of Age’ and ‘We’re The Ones’ carried a glittering optimism, this new track opens the door onto the album’s darker second half and immediately changes the temperature.

Due in full on 9th September, Good For The Soul is shaping up less like a collection of songs sharing one mood and more like two sides of the same person talking back to each other. ‘So Lonely, Lonely’ brings isolation, restless consumption and the need for actual human connection into focus, with Renee Stormz arriving midway through to give the song another burst of urgency.

Shiny things, empty rooms and real connection

Natalie McCool starts with a deceptively simple question: what happens when you keep chasing things that are supposed to make life feel full and still end up lonely? The lyrics circle pride, possessions and the endless attraction of the next shiny thing, treating them less as pleasures than distractions from whatever is missing underneath.

There is a sharper edge here than on the album’s earlier singles. Natalie questions the urge to create problems simply so we can solve them, then points towards a culture where even love risks being measured through what we can buy. It is social criticism delivered without turning the song into a lecture, which suits her instinct for putting uncomfortable thoughts inside something immediate.

Renee pushes the idea firmly into the present tense. A crowded room becomes lonely, a phone keeps demanding attention and “tap tap click click” catches time disappearing into a screen while everybody supposedly connected to everybody else somehow feels further apart.

Renee also gives the track one of its sharpest flashes of frustration, imagining doing something absurdly attention-grabbing simply to see whether anybody is paying attention. Beneath the humour is the same question running through the whole song: are we being seen, or are we all performing at one another through glass?

The answer ‘So Lonely, Lonely’ keeps reaching for is refreshingly uncomplicated. Real connection beats the race, the purchase, the notification and whatever glittering distraction is being waved around next. Natalie’s breathier delivery against Renee’s more forceful guest section gives that argument two different textures without pulling the song apart.

There are horns from Paul Frith, drums from Paul Crilly of The Mysterines and backing vocals from IONE, with Natalie and Paul Frith handling recording and production before Andy Hall Hall adds further production and the mix. The arrangement gives the darker idea enough colour to stop the track sinking under its own subject.

The contrast becomes even more intriguing beside the wider Good For The Soul picture. Natalie has already moved through self-acceptance, youthful optimism and now a much colder look at isolation, giving each new single its own identity while making the album itself harder to second-guess.

And yes, my anticipation for Good For The Soul has now become slightly ridiculous. Each new track has shown another angle without making the album feel scattered, and Natalie remains terribly easy to have a crush on when she can sound this cool while politely pointing out that half the things we spend our lives chasing are probably making us miserable.

‘So Lonely, Lonely’ review

‘So Lonely, Lonely’ works because its darkness never becomes dreary. Natalie keeps a cool restraint through the verses, while the repetition of the title creates an almost nagging emptiness beneath the song, and Renee arrives with enough momentum to make the second half feel newly unsettled. You can fill the room, fill the basket and fill the screen, yet still have nobody properly there.

It also makes the forthcoming album considerably harder to predict, which is exactly where I want it. ‘Coming of Age’ and ‘We’re The Ones’ showed how brightly Natalie can make this world glow, but ‘So Lonely, Lonely’ lets the shadows sit beside that optimism rather than tidying them away. If this is the doorway into Disc 2, 9th September cannot arrive quickly enough.

Follow Natalie McCool on Instagram and find Good For The Soul on Spotify.

Photo Credit: Robin Clewley