The most powerful moment on Guitar arrives just 45 seconds into the fourth track, “Nightmare.” The song starts already in motion, with DeMarco’s voice coming in so early it feels like he’s rushing to confess something he’s been holding back. Maybe there’s been a fight, and his partner is still asleep in the next room. It’s a miracle, he admits, that she stays at all. “Roll up those sleeves, boy,” he sings in a soft, almost fragile falsetto, gentle as a worn-in teddy bear. “Smoke the whole pack / There’s no turning back from this one.” In just a few lines, he captures that lifelong tug-of-war—trying to get it together, trying to be worthy of the love you somehow found.
By all accounts, DeMarco’s partner, Kiera McNally, has shown incredible patience, standing by him through chaotic early days all the way to these quieter times pruning olive trees on a remote island. And here he is, waking up tangled in regret, determined to be better.
In just two minutes, “Nightmare” captures the heart of this album—DeMarco taking a hard look at his past while mustering the resolve to become who he wants to be. That tension echoes throughout Guitar. On “Knockin’,” a laid-back country-funk tune, old regrets show up like unwanted guests at the house he built for his future. “Home” drifts like a hazy George Harrison daydream, with DeMarco reflecting on people and places he left behind—each one a ghost there to remind him of where he’s failed. Every beat feels like another hurdle he’s pushing himself to clear.
But it’s the songs about hope—about trying—that make Guitar so deeply moving. “Sweeter” sounds like it’s coming from rock bottom, a confession from someone who’s messed up one too many times. Yet when DeMarco promises, “This time, I will be sweeter / I can be much sweeter,” it’s so honest and straightforward that you can’t help but root for him. On “Punishment,” he goes searching for the part of himself that can fight off his worst impulses. “Holy” is even more direct—a plea to break free from a “curse from down below.” You can almost feel the old chains starting to loosen.
DeMarco’s first album came out the month I got engaged; his second landed just before I turned 30 and got married. Back when his music was all about late nights and bad habits, I was wrestling with my own. His songs felt like a distorted mirror. Now, listening to Guitar, it seems like he’s caught that same reflection—someone trying to outrun a past threaded with addiction. But these songs, tender and raw and cautiously hopeful, make it clear he’s getting somewhere. “All those days of trying to run / What a waste of breath,” he sings, like he’s finally letting go of a breath he’s been holding for years. Maybe no matter what you’re up against, you can still try to be a little like this version of Mac DeMarco, too.