Album Review: Meg MacKay, Clown Baby

Meg MacKay has been a local favourite in the Toronto comedy scene, and for good reason. Smart, charming, and endlessly playful, Meg crafts a beautiful scene as effortlessly as they can dash it with a smart quip and observation.

Clown Baby is the artist’s second album and provides an arc of sorts for their own coming of age, while also offering a quick snapshot of PEI, and Toronto with a brief and funny stop-over in Los Angeles, California, America, of all places. We can note an influence (or overlap) of Maria Bamford in their playful use of voices, but what makes Meg truly unique is their ability to effortlessly switch from witness to subject.

Mackay regales us with stories about growing up in PEI, giving us an alternative version of the scenic images we’re used to, and instead centres teenage Meg and the artist’s colourful neighbours. The album gives us a snapshot into dating as a millennial in the internet age, how epically hopeful a young heart can be in the face of heartbreak, and how living in Toronto desperately (industriously?) trying to make ends meet invites hilariously memorably scenarios into your sphere. Clown Baby leaves you wanting more, of which there is from this prolific young writer. 

Clown Baby was released September 15, 2023 on Howl & Roar Records.
Listen to it here.