“One of the craziest things about growing up,” said Charly Bliss singer Eva Hendricks, “is moving away from the things you did when you were young and stupid.” On the band's last two albums and a couple of EPs, Hendricks shrewdly recounted those youthful, foolish experiences: falling in love with a jerk, getting dumped at your birthday party, chasing yourself with youthful ambition. Everythingthe Brooklyn band's third album, pulls off an impressive feat: In some of their biggest, most ambitious pop songs, they take advantage of those moments of emotional overload while infusing them with the sense of perspective that comes from growing up a little.
On their first two albums, Charly Bliss balanced sweetness and angst, even as their sound shifted from the tightly coiled pop-rock of their debut to the moody, new-wave synth pop of the follow-up. Hendricks has often mentioned the Josie and the Pussycats The soundtrack as a key inspiration, and there's more than a little Letters to Cleo and the Breeders in Charly Bliss' DNA. Everything it doesn't sacrifice toughness, but a bold, bright pop sound prevails. The jagged guitars of “I Don't Know Anything” and “I'm Not Dead” are a nod to the band's indie-rock roots. But the squinting and shimmering “Back There Now” and the slow-moving “Here Comes the Darkness” aren't far removed from Carly Rae Jepsen's B-sides. the chorus of the explosive “Calling You Out” aims for stadium rafters. Hendricks' self-examination, too, is heightened—and along with self-incriminating songs about delusional crushes (“Tragic”) and picking silly fights with your lover (“Calling You Out”), there are odes to the joys of new love (” Last First Kiss”) and even in the love shared between her bandmates (“Waiting For You”).
Hendricks is perhaps funniest when he sings about coming of age while being a touring indie musician. On “I Don't Know Anything,” he wonders what it means to sell out, whether “as '90s rock revivalists/We're too late.” It's not exactly a ubiquitous problem, but he knows how to make it universal: When he sings, “You bet on yourself and lose every day,” it can resonate with strugglers and dreamers staring down a possible global recession, not just them. who expect crappy payouts on Spotify. On the swinging “I'm Not Dead,” Hendricks sings jealously of her boyfriend's seven-day-old baby daddy: “His life is more fun and fuller than mine,” she sighs. “If I'm a rock star, I'm not doing it right.” But it gets upbeat in the chorus, as the whole band creates a classically energetic to cathartic effect. Maybe in the end, they'll wish they'd “fucked at least twice as long and had twice as much fun”—but hey, as the song's title states, at least we still have time.
