A few months ago, All Dogs leader Maryn Jones put out a solo album under the name Yowler — The Offer was a ghostly collection of songs, which sounded like it was written by candlelight during one’s darkest moments. “Skin” is the track on Kicking Every Day that comes closest to approaching the same headspace, a somber funereal to a relationship that was doomed from the start. In many ways, All Dogs songs catalog all the ways in which we don’t measure up. And where lead single “That Kind Of Girl” externalized that, taking issue with how we are perceived by others, “Skin” feels more insular: “Don’t you ever say that I’m wrong because I won’t take it,” Jones sings. “I will find a way to justify my pain/ I will cry, I will lie, and I won’t be satisfied.”

Jones sounds unmoored here, eager to open up but unable to find herself among the pain. There’s a sense that she’s repeating a cycle, one in which she’s set herself up for failure: “There is a quiet familiar feeling, and in it I am always waiting for everything to fall, just like I always make it so.” Sometimes, the only person we have to blame is ourself. We distance ourselves because we don’t want to be hurt, which in turn just causes more hurt, because we’ve seen this situation play out too many times. We are purposefully obtuse, we burrow into our own head and never come up for air. We self-sabotage because we’re afraid. “Skin” gets to the heart of that, and it sounds both apologetic for and resigned to our fate. Listen below.

Tour Dates:
08/18 Richmond, VA @ Strange Matter *
08/19 Baltimore, MD @ Metro Gallery *
08/20 Asbury Park, NJ @ Asbury Lanes *
08/21 Philadelphia, PA @ PhilaMOCA *
08/22 Brooklyn, NY @ Silent Barn *
08/23 Easthampton, MA @ Flywheel *
08/24 Allston, MA @ O’Briens Pub *
08/25 Danbury, CT @ Heirloom Arts Theatre *
08/26 Pittsburgh, PA @ Mr. Roboto Project *
08/27 Lakewood, OH @ Mahall’s *
08/29 Columbus, OH @ Carabar *
* w/ the Sidekicks

Kicking Every Day is out 8/28 via Salinas Records.