When Chloe Slater released her first EP in 2024 titled You Can’t Put A Price On Fun, she left her mark as an artist who  would not shy away from discussing politics, and how it feels being young in this era of corruption and uncertainty. In her debut album Riot Youth she keeps it raw and real, feeling like a big sister to her EP. Slater has written an album that is political and deeply personal to experiences that today’s youth can relate to right now. Whilst she continues to touch on the political issues that she’s mentioned before, such as the climate or consumerism, they don't feel any less relevant or redundant, but a deeper dive into these topics. Slater pushes beyond politics as well, branching out to nostalgia for your youth and finding hope in times that feel dark. Slater in an interview with NME describes Riot Youth as “a spirit of feeling found not exclusively but most often, in young minds and young hearts due to the absence of learned helplessness.”

Slater opens with ‘Mother Nature’s Killing Spree’, a brutally honest reflection on modern climate anxiety. It’s almost deceptively happy, but as Slater sings “the thought of losing you makes me sick/maybe we could just let it tick,” it’s the fear of losing everything, knowing things must change but not knowing what to do. My favorite part of this song is the introduction in which it is just Slater’s voice, muffled as if it’s coming from an old radio and a guitar. She sings “Don’t wanna say I told you so” before the radio scratches out and the guitar kicks in. It feels like from past warnings into the future, past the point of no return.

In ‘Can I Finish Please?’ Slater sets the scene of a family function where the older generation keeps putting you down and ignoring what you have to say. The chorus emphasises that feeling incredibly well; a lyric that stood out was “you’ve never been twenty in this century.” I can’t count how many times I have wanted to say that to a family member trying to tell me how to feel. However, like many songs on this album, Slater’s way of singing her verses directly to her listeners has been repeated throughout the album. This was a pattern in her EP as well, especially in ‘24 Hours’, a song that saw a lot of attention on social media because of this style. This method isn’t necessarily bad, and does work with her songs, but it gets a bit repetitive and loses its edge once it’s been overdone. I would love to see her move away from it more.

And Slater does move away from this way of singing in ‘The Underground’. One of my personal favorites and really driving home that feeling of hopefulness, this track is a story of living in a soulless city and finding that one person that makes you feel at home. Slater sings of London, the real London beyond ‘Notting Hill and Bridget Jones’ highlighting how expensive it is, and how empty it can feel instead of what is portrayed on TV. It's a love letter to that one person that makes everything worth it; “You’ve filled my cup/that always seems half empty.”

On the subject of love letters, ‘Southern Youth’ is one of the album’s singles, and is a touching, nostalgic love letter to Slater's home in Bournesmouth, and the feeling of leaving it behind, which she did at 18. This track contemplates having dreamt of this moving away while she was there, but realising that she should’ve held her youth home a little dearer whilst experiencing it. Another sentiment the younger generation are all too familiar with. A lyric that really stood out to me was “I’m glad I moved away/But maybe I went too far,” because the song isn’t simply about regretting the move; it’s the feeling of wishing you were just a little bit closer and you could have just a little more time. What Slater captures is that little feeling of longing for what’s familiar even if you’re happy where you are.

Slater closes the album out with ‘Let It Happen’. This song doesn’t have the edge to it that the others do, just Slater and a piano. On my first listen out of all the songs, ‘Let It Happen’ stood out because it felt so removed from the rest of the album. It’s considerably slower and less angry, but more confused about how we got here in the first place. “Why did we let it happen?” is the question being asked throughout the song, and that is something I have asked myself a lot recently as I’ve read the news. Slater ends the album with an important message: “If you don’t ask why/if you close your eyes/then it happens.” It’s a plea to her listeners to keep asking questions and keep fighting for change. Riot Youth emphasises what’s wrong, and asks her audience and her generation to push for change so we don’t have to live in a world of constant consequences. 

Of all the times to release Riot Youth, I think now is perfect. It’s both critical and hopeful, an attitude we need to have towards the world. Despite being political, it isn’t overly preachy. Slater even says in ‘Get Me Out’ that ‘I’m not here to preach’, and she truly isn’t. I can’t get enough of this album and am so excited that this is just the beginning of her career. I can’t wait to see what she does next.