Marika Hackman has never been the kind of artist who waits for permission. She writes, produces, arranges, and plays nearly everything herself, and her new album finds her even more deeply in control of her own vision. False Dogs, her fifth studio album, is due out February 19 via Chrysalis Records, and it follows last year’s Big Sigh with a quiet but confident momentum. The announcement alone feels like an event: Hackman made the record in her East London studio, then took it to a converted chapel on the Kent coast, and the result sounds like a world built from her own hands. She plays guitars, piano, drums, bass, mandolin, and synth across the album, which is not a flex but a necessity—she has a way of shaping sound that is intimate and expansive at once. There’s a sense that these songs could only exist in her voice, in her arrangements, in the spaces she creates for them. There is no separation between the person and the work; the songs feel like extensions of her own body, her own history, her own way of moving through the world. That might sound intense, but it’s also what makes her music so compelling. You never get the sense that she’s performing someone else’s idea of what an artist should be. She’s simply being herself, and that’s rare. For longtime listeners, this level of authorship is nothing new. Hackman has always trusted her instincts, even when those instincts lead to strange or uncomfortable places. But False Dogs feels like a culmination, a record that gathers all her previous experiments and pushes them into something new. It’s also a deeply personal record, made with the people she loves, in places that mean something to her. That intimacy is audible in every track, from the way the instruments breathe to the way the silence between sounds feels intentional. This is not an album made by committee. It’s an album made by an artist who knows exactly what she wants to say and how to say it.
To announce the album, Hackman shared its opening track and first single, “33,” along with a music video created by JOFI Films and conceptualized with Hackman herself. The song is about the passage of time, but it doesn’t approach the subject with the usual anxiety or regret. Instead, it feels like a negotiation. There’s a shadow character in the song—a children’s choir—that urges her to keep going, even as she is caught between nostalgia for what’s behind and fear of what’s ahead. The choice to use a children’s choir is inspired. Their voices are pure, almost eerily so, and they carry a kind of authority that adults have learned to doubt. When they sing, it’s as if the past itself is speaking to her, not as a warning but as a gentle push. The children’s choir is not a gimmick. It’s a structural choice, a way of giving voice to something that can’t be easily articulated. In a song about time, it makes sense that the voices of children—who haven’t yet learned to fear the future—would be the ones urging her forward. The video, which Hackman helped conceptualize, deepens that sense of being pulled between worlds. It’s not a literal narrative; it’s more of a visual poem, full of images that feel both familiar and strange. “33” works as an introduction because it contains the whole album’s tension: the desire to hold on to wonder while accepting that time moves forward. It’s a song about growing up, but it’s not sentimental about it. It’s honest, a little strange, and deeply human. The song also sets the tone for the album’s sonic world. The choir, the field recordings, the delicate interplay between acoustic and electronic elements—all of it is there in miniature. Listening to “33” feels like opening a door and stepping into a room you didn’t know existed, but somehow recognize immediately. It’s the kind of song that stays with you, not because it’s catchy, but because it’s true.
The album’s title, False Dogs, is a deliberate misspelling of “false gods,” and that small, almost playful twist says a lot about Hackman’s approach. She’s not interested in dogma or easy answers. She’s interested in the beliefs and imagined structures people accept unquestioningly as children and then have to set aside as they get older. Those false gods might be religion, or romance, or the idea that life will follow a certain script. They might be the expectations we inherit without realizing it—the milestones we’re supposed to hit, the person we’re supposed to become by a certain age. False Dogs is about reaching those milestones in your mid-thirties and discovering that they don’t feel the way you expected. Hackman has said that wrestling with what’s expected of people at certain ages “allowed me to really reflect on all the things that make life wonderful.” That’s the heart of the album. It’s not cynical. It’s not a rejection of adulthood. It’s a clearing away of the noise so that something truer can emerge. The title is a wink, a correction, a gentle mockery of the idea that anyone has it figured out. And in that space, Hackman finds room for gratitude, for wonder, for the messy, unglamorous beauty of an ordinary life. It’s a record about becoming yourself after you’ve stopped trying to become what you were told to be. We all carry these false gods with us, sometimes without knowing it. They show up in the way we compare ourselves to others, in the goals we chase because we were told they matter, in the quiet sense that we’re falling behind. Hackman’s album doesn’t offer a solution so much as a release. By naming the false gods, she takes away some of their power. The misspelling matters, too. “False Dogs” is not a phrase you hear every day, and it forces you to pause, to question, to look for meaning. That’s exactly what the album asks of its listeners. Don’t accept the obvious. Look closer. The truth might be stranger, funnier, and more beautiful than you expected.
The making of False Dogs was as much about place as it was about sound. Hackman started in her East London studio, where she spent hours experimenting with textures and arrangements, letting songs grow in their own time. That kind of open-ended process can be exhausting, but it also allows for accidents—the happy discoveries that happen when you’re not trying to force anything. After that, she took the material to Big Jelly Studios in Ramsgate, a converted chapel in Kent, for a focused ten-day session. The change of scenery clearly mattered. She worked with longtime collaborators Charlie Andrew and Polly Mackey, who also records as Art School Girlfriend and happens to be Hackman’s wife. There’s a comfort and trust in that setup, a sense that the people in the room are there for the music, not for the industry. The fact that she brought her wife into the creative process is another sign of how personal this record is. Art School Girlfriend’s own music has a similar sensitivity to space and texture, so it’s easy to imagine the two of them working together in the chapel, trading ideas, finding the right sound for each song. And then there are the field recordings: crashing waves, church bells, fireworks, all captured along the Kent coast and woven throughout the album. These sounds do more than add atmosphere. They anchor the record in a specific time and place, reminding you that these songs were made by a person who walked along the sea, heard bells ringing, watched fireworks burst over the water. It’s a reminder that music doesn’t have to be abstract. It can be grounded, tactile, full of the world. The chapel setting probably helped too. There’s something about recording in a space that was built for contemplation that makes you slow down, listen more carefully, and consider what you’re doing. Hackman has always been a meticulous arranger, but False Dogs has a warmth that suggests she allowed herself to be present in the moment, to let the environment shape the music rather than imposing her will on it. It’s not just about the big moments; it’s about the way a room sounds when it’s empty, the way a wave sounds from a distance, the way a bell fades into silence.
The tracklist reads like a journey, with “33” opening the album and “Crimson” closing it. In between, there are songs with titles that feel like small stories: “Close To Me,” “I’m Good,” “Handsome,” “The Blows,” “Be Surprised,” “Everything You Wanted,” “Ha_Happy,” “Half Painted Dog,” “Hello Sunshine,” “Lying Down.” Some of these titles are wry, some are tender, some are almost absurd. “Half Painted Dog” in particular feels like a perfect Hackman title—something unfinished, a little awkward, but full of character. There’s also a playful side to the tracklist. “Ha_Happy” looks like a typo or a private joke, and “Half Painted Dog” sounds like something you’d find in a dream. These titles suggest that Hackman isn’t taking herself too seriously, even while she’s making serious art. That balance is part of what makes the album work. The album’s sonic palette is just as varied. With Hackman playing guitars, piano, drums, bass, mandolin, and synth, the record moves between intimate acoustic moments and more layered, atmospheric passages. The children’s choir on “33” is just one example of her willingness to incorporate unexpected elements. The field recordings add another dimension, making the album feel less like a collection of songs and more like a continuous piece of art. There’s a flow to the tracklist that rewards listening from start to finish, the way albums used to be consumed. It’s not a playlist; it’s a statement. Each song seems to feed into the next, building a larger narrative about time, identity, and the strange comfort of letting go. By the time “Crimson” arrives, you feel like you’ve been somewhere—not just listened to something. The sequencing is deliberate, and it shows in the way the album breathes. There are moments of quiet, moments of noise, moments of pure pop clarity, and moments that feel like they’re dissolving into the sea. It’s a record that asks to be experienced, not just heard.
False Dogs is out February 19, and it’s already available for pre-order. But the album is more than a release date or a list of songs. It’s a reminder that making art can be an act of self-discovery, a way of sorting through the stories we’ve been told and deciding which ones to keep. Hackman has always been a restless, curious artist, but False Dogs feels like a new level of confidence. She wrote it, produced it, arranged it, and played nearly every note on it. She brought in her wife, her longtime collaborators, and a children’s choir. She recorded waves and bells and fireworks and turned them into music. She made something that is deeply personal and somehow universal at the same time. In a world that often demands we have everything figured out, Hackman offers something better: permission to be uncertain, to be in between, to be human. False Dogs is not about false gods or false dogs. It’s about the process of letting go of the things that were never real in the first place, and finding, in that letting go, a life that is actually worth living. It’s a beautiful, strange, and deeply felt record, and it’s coming soon. For now, we have “33” to hold onto—a song that asks us to keep going, even when we don’t know what’s ahead. That’s not a bad way to start a new year, or a new chapter. When the album finally arrives, it will likely feel like a companion, a friend, a mirror. And in the meantime, there’s the promise of it—the knowledge that Hackman has once again turned her restless mind into something we can hold, listen to, and carry with us. It’s easy to imagine these songs becoming part of people’s lives—soundtracks for long walks, late-night drives, quiet mornings. That’s the kind of record False Dogs is. It doesn’t demand attention; it earns it. And once you let it in, it’s hard to let go.