by Jade Winings (@jadewinings)
Indie-gazers Bleary Eyed have released their latest four track EP after signing with Born Loser Records, a Philly music staple. The Bleary Eyed release could totally end up on a coming-of-age film soundtrack, and can be seen as an “evolved” sound as it contains familiar shoegaze undertones from the band’s prior release Guise, combining with the new EP’s indie-pop choruses and dreamy synths. The challenge of creating perfect flow within only four tracks has surpassed success. Listening to Bleary Eyed front-to-back serves a cohesive pattern weaving through indie-pop energy with heavy gaze incorporated inbetween.
Highlighting the psychedelic distortion and an unexpected poppy chorus, the first single “Run” is a fantastic way to introduce the album. “Run” perfectly sums up the phrase “it was fun while it lasted,” as it is described to be about “refinding your identity” after experiencing social isolation, feeling lost, and getting knocked down by unexpected people. The track expresses the personal results of becoming self-aware of one’s changing environment and how these changes are changing one’s self as well.
The second single “Wreck” was clever to release back-to-back due to the track’s mutually suiting theme of self-awarness, only now the writer is becoming aware of how self–unaware someone else is. “Wreck” has an attitude of being over a person’s self-suffering facade after noticing the damage being done is self-sabotage. It almost feels gross to see the person for who they are, whether it has been a change over time or if you have been blind to their flaws. “Put thoughts before your words,” Nathaniel Salfi sings, which agreeably is not that hard.
As the shoegaze guitar amplifies further into the track “Tree,” the fuzz transforms into Margot Whipps’ chimey vocals on the ending track “Mean”. Despite the harsh feelings of learning how to deal with the frustration of being rained on by others or being mean to one’s self, “Mean” could be felt as the calmest track on the EP as it embraces how well Salfi and Whipps compliment each other in soft-acoustic harmonies. Bleary Eyed performed an amazing job wrapping up the EP, and listeners will be and should be stoked to hear what they have coming next.