'Them's The Cards': Billy Nomates On Resilience, Playing Live and 'Metalhorse'
Thursday, 12 June 2025
Written by Jack Butler-Terry
Photo: Jack Dallas-Chapman
On June 23, 2023, Tor Maries played to the biggest crowd of her career at Glastonbury. Just three days later, she was asking the BBC to delete the footage of her performance from socials and stating that there would not be any more live shows from Billy Nomates, a project that had sparked into life in 2020 off the back of some perfectly-observed post-punk social commentary. “It’s fucking weird to wake up in the morning and have Steve from wherever-the-fuck go, ‘Somebody shoot this white trash’,” Maries reflects.
The torrent of abuse she received online following that performance was shocking, with internet trolls commenting on her appearance, her performance and her music. Tabloid newspapers started running stories about the debacle, fanning the flames. It all came at the worst possible time.
“I’d just come off my ‘Cacti’ tour, which was really successful, but I was burnt out and my dad was dying,” Maries says. “Suddenly, I was trying to balance Glastonbury as the biggest moment I'd had as Billy Nomates, with the lowest personal moment in my life. You could blow me, and I might have fallen over. I think that’s all it took. It wasn’t a mighty wave. It was just this little thing, and it really took me down.”
But Maries didn’t stay down. Her recently released third studio album, ‘Metalhorse’, was written throughout the course of 2024, its focus shifting with the events in her life. It revolves around the image of a dilapidated funfair; a place that was once fun and full of life and colour, that now sits rusted, broken and silent. It’s a stark and emotionally brutal metaphor that shows the loss of joy in life.
“There are elements of it that do feel quite sad,” she admits. “I got one of the first physical copies and the first thing I did was put it in a box of all my dad’s things. But, to be honest with you, it was ultimately a good thing. Writing ‘Metalhorse’ last year was a reason to get up in the morning for a long time. It was a real saviour.”
The record also marked a recalibration in how Maries worked. Having historically written, performed and recorded her albums solo, she went into the ‘Metalhorse’ sessions with a band, with Liam Chapman on drums and Mandy Clark on bass. The trio travelled to Spain, where they lived for two weeks to rewrite and record the album at Paco Loco in Seville. Or, at least, that was the plan.
“I’m constantly trying to change up the way I work, but we ended up going back to the way I normally work,” Maries muses. “Mandy was supposed to come with us, and the day we got there she had some really tragic news, and she had to go home immediately. It was literally the hour we landed.”
As jarring as it may have been to have plans ripped out from under her, it put Maries back into familiar territory and a position that ultimately helped ‘Metalhorse’ become one of her best works to date. “We ended up building it without bass, which on a Billy Nomates album is just as important as the melody,” Maries says. “It felt like we were constantly going, ‘What do we need to do here?’ and ‘What needs to happen there?’ I think it’s a fuller album, because sometimes when the bass is in, you just go, ‘That’s it, it’s done.’ This was like ‘We’ve got some time to experiment, so why don't we just fuck about with that little drum machine?’”
Despite these changes, Billy Nomates’ DNA is still all over ‘Metalhorse’, in contemplative lyrics that draw you in with emotion and intrigue; bright music that bounces and cavorts; and all the hallmarks of an artist who has absorbed some of life’s toughest experiences and become bigger and better for it.
“Override has become sort of a bit of a favorite,” Maries says. “It’s just got a great groove to it. I did a show in Bristol and I threw it in there, and I think it’s going to be one of those songs where it goes off live quite well. Nothin Worth Winnin is strangely fun, because it’s so mopey, and I love it. Moon Explodes is turning out to be very, very heavy, which I’m enjoying. We did it the other day, and I was thinking, ‘Bloody hell’. But that’s really fun.”
As you might have gathered, Maries’ moratorium on live shows was short-lived. She even returned to Worthy Farm in 2024 for a bigger show. “It was just after my dad had passed, so it was very sad for different reasons, but I did a duet with Billy Bragg, and I headlined the Left Field Stage, and I had a ball,” she says. “Now, when I talk about Glastonbury, I put it in the category of ‘Which one?’”
She’s still dealing with slings and arrows, though. Recently, Maries was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and is approaching it with the usual blend of steely resolve and humour. “The first thing I said when they told me was ‘Am I going to die?’ because I knew so little about it,” she says with a laugh.
“Now, I know it’s a very livable condition, and it’s very workable with medication. I’m just going to look after myself and crack on with it, and I’ve spoken to other musicians who have MS and the general consensus is you just carry on. I’m aware that my hands aren’t quite as on the ball as they should be, but on those days, you step back and you don’t try a Steve Vai solo.”
For Maries, part of cracking on involves a slew of tour dates and festivals lined up throughout the summer, with a UK tour kicking off towards the end of September at Electric Bristol. “I would also just like to keep writing,” she observes. “I really enjoyed getting involved in a theatre project last year, and I’m enjoying narrative-based writing, I think, because the world’s so fucking harrowing and I like the escapism.”
Maries is living, breathing proof that the show must go on. “Them’s the cards,” she shrugs. Staring down the bleakest kind of adversity, she has turned in triumphant live performances and massive festival shows, along with a new career best album in ‘Metalhorse’ that is as unapologetic and multi-layered as the artist herself. How’s that for never letting the bastards grind you down?
Billy Nomates’ ‘Metalhorse’ is out now on Invada Records.
Billy Nomates Upcoming Tour Dates are as follows:
Wed September 24 2025 - BRISTOL Electric Bristol
Thu September 25 2025 - EXETER Exeter Phoenix
Fri September 26 2025 - SOUTHAMPTON Papillon
Sun September 28 2025 - BRIGHTON Chalk
Mon September 29 2025 - NORWICH Waterfront
Wed October 01 2025 - LEEDS Project House
Thu October 02 2025 - MANCHESTER Manchester Academy 2
Fri October 03 2025 - GLASGOW SWG3 TV Studio
Sun October 05 2025 - GATESHEAD Glasshouse Intl Centre for Music
Mon October 06 2025 - SHEFFIELD Leadmill
Tue October 07 2025 - NOTTINGHAM Metronome
Thu October 09 2025 - LONDON Electric Ballroom
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