by Hayden Merrick (@HaydenMerrick96)
Listening to Tell Me What You Miss The Most is like spending the day with Tasha. The Chicago songwriter’s second album, which infuses earnest indie pop with smooth R&B, begins with “Bed Song 1” and culminates with “Bed Song 2,” both of which have the same open E guitar tuning and put the bed quite literally in bedroom pop. Their titles read like rushed voice memo placeholders, adding to the relaxed, intimate atmosphere of the album, even though they had even more primitive names before (“plucky thing EBEG#BE”).
Between the bookends, Tasha walks us through lakeside contemplation, self-care, the poignancy of reflecting on a past relationship, all the while her desires drifting between wanting to stay in bed all day and wanting to “find someplace we can go out and dance.” It’s what gets her out of bed: The competing motivators of love and music. “I wish I could stay in this bed all day long/But I quite like the way pretty girls sway to my songs,” she sings on the opening track.
On the ebullient single “Perfect Wife,” Tasha embraces the delusional joy one feels after an auspicious first date. The chords are jazzy, the drums groovy, and her voice is rich and pleasant. Her perfect wife isn’t actual, but we’ve all felt the post-date dizziness, allowed our emotions to spiral, and unashamedly pictured our lives with someone we’ve newly met.
Tasha is more composed on “Burton Island,” a delicate slumberer written while she sat on a rock admiring a lake in Vermont. “Lay on this lapping shore/Every lake reminds me of another I’ve swam before,” she sings over her acoustic guitar as it arpeggiates suspended chords with quiet contentment. The lakes heretofore swam may be allegorical for her relationships. After all, she told Consequence that the album was about “That moment of shared remembering, bittersweet and comforting,” hence the album’s title—a request posed to her previous partners.
An unexpected highlight is “Love Interlude,” a reflective pause before the album’s second half. Over nature sounds, chimes, and bright spacious strums, Tasha reads lines from her journal. Only mildly less intimate, the love-slathered waltz of “Dream Still” is ready to score a Richard Curtis film about long-distance lovers, Vivian McConnell’s flute flitting atop creamy guitars.
“Year From Now” is a self-pep talk; an instruction manual on coping: “Go out for a drive, go out for a smoke/Look for a sign of life in every breath and every sky and every handhold.” She’s looking after herself now. Nature, dancing, imagining the future—there’s much to celebrate. It’s a valedictory realization. At the end of this penultimate track, she whispers to herself, “Tasha, you’re brighter than you’ve ever been,” before crawling back into bed.