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Thursday, May 24, 2018
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
ARTS

MOM + POP MUSIC

Charly Bliss tour 
ends with gusto

Courtney Barnett asks 
for sincerity in ‘Tell Me’

COMMUNITY CULTURE REVIEW

Courtney Barnett’s second 
album begins: “Y’know what 
they say / No one’s born to hate 
/ We learn it somewhere along 
the way.” Paraphrased from 
Nelson Mandela, that line from 
the opener “Hopefulessness” 
sets the tone for the rest of Tell 
Me How You Really Feel, a tri-
umphant return after her debut 
LP, Sometimes I Sit and Think, 
And Sometimes I Just Sit and a 
2017 collaboration with singer-
songwriter Kurt Vile.
Tell Me still carries Barnett’s 
signature 
rambling, 
deadpan 
delivery, but with a darker fla-
vor than her previous releases. 
Through thirty-seven minutes 
Barnett holds court with her 
friends, lovers and enemies 
with strength and piercing wit, 
touching on issues like femi-
nism and isolation with a noisy 
rock edge. At its base, the Aussie 
songwriter’s sophomore effort 
is a record about truth in all its 
forms, be it hard to swallow or 
written on the wall.
Beyond these subtle changes 
from her past work, it’s all but 
obvious that Tell Me is a cathar-
tic release for Barnett. Those 
already fans of the artist are 
probably more familiar with a 
laid-back, 
sardonic 
approach 
present in earlier songs like 
“Avant Gardener,” in which she 

narrates her own asthma attack, 
and “History Eraser,” about the 
confusing beginnings of love. 
This record is notably more 
pissed-off than Barnett’s first, 
both attached and apathetic to 
her experiences and relation-
ships as a woman in the world.
She navigates feedback-laced 
webs of sound to push through 
a 
message 
of 
individualism 
and transparency, most notice-
able on anthems “I’m Not Your 
Mother, I’m Not Your Bitch,” 

taking 
on 
the 
virgin-whore 
complex one guitar stroke at a 
time. Nonetheless, the song-
writer manages to maintain her 
classic dark humor throughout 
the album, even making a song 
titled “Crippling Self Doubt and 
a General Lack of Self Control” 
witty with lines like “And inde-
cision rots / like a bag of last 
week’s meat.” Barnett might not 
be funny on this record, but she 
sure is honest. And what is more 
hilarious than the realities of 
life?
The artist focuses in on this 
honesty throughout the album’s 

first single “Nameless, Face-
less,” the title a nod to Nirvana’s 
“Endless, Nameless” and an 
angered response to the unjust 
realities of being a woman. 
She references iconic feminist 
author Margaret Atwood in the 
chorus with the sharp-tongued 
line “Men are afraid that women 
will laugh at them / Women are 
afraid that men will kill them” 
with a sharp tongue. The song is 
big, headstrong and truly rocks 
hard — it’s a women’s anthem 
without any frills, and certainly 
no beating around the bush.
Though much of Tell Me How 
You Really Feel is hard-edged, 
songs like the album’s crown 
jewel 
“City 
Looks 
Pretty,” 
“Charity” and others are almost 
happy-sounding. They attack 
tough issues of isolation, impos-
ter syndrome and unhappiness, 
but Barnett’s signature story-
telling and musical prowess 
manages to flip them into dance-
able rock bangers. It forces an 
audience to recognize the songs’ 
lyrics as they enjoy the music, 
which is valuable in itself; Bar-
nett isn’t hiding anything from 
her listeners, proving that joy 
and anger can coexist, and even 
create some really fantastic 
music. At the end of the day, all 
the singer wants to do is “Walk 
through the park in the dark.” 
In this record, Barnett poses 
a question we should all think 
about: Why can’t she?

CLARA SCOTT
Daily Arts Writer

On May 18, Charly Bliss brought 
their brand of snarky, sugar-rush 
indie rock to Ferndale’s The Loving 
Touch. In the beginning, the crowd 
was stirring a bit, due to opener Skat-
ing Polly having a medical emergen-
cy and unable to perform, but once 
Eva Hendricks and company hit the 
stage, they had everyone’s attention.
What makes Charly Bliss so mag-
netic is, hands down, their front-
woman. Hendricks commands the 
stage with a bewitching, off-kilter 
poise. She’s conscious of it, too. She 
keeps her bleached hair in a long 
bang across her forehead, a la 2007 
MySpace Emo, that started to stick 
with sweat to her forehead as the 
show progressed. More than her 
appearance, however, is her abil-
ity as a performer. Hendricks has 
the high, honeyed voice of a toddler 
that is praising a puppy. The contrast 
between her voice’s qualities and lyr-
ics like “I can’t cum and I can’t lie / I 
can’t stop making myself cry” is one 
of the essential strengths of Charly 
Bliss.
That isn’t to say, however, that she 
overshadows her bandmates. Bass-
ist Dan Shure and drummer Sam 
Hendricks provide backing vocals 
on most songs, and guitarist Spencer 
Fox absolutely shreds on tracks like 
“Love Me” and “Black Hole.” There’s 
an understanding that, yes, Eva is 
the most charismatic, but Fox brings 
the technical prowess and Shure and 
Sam keep the group on track.
Their set opened with smaller 
hits, like “Westermarck,” “Ruby” 
and “Glitter,” from their debut album 
Guppy, and it was a pleasure to watch 

Charly Bliss wind themselves up for 
the songs everyone was waiting for: 
“Black Hole” and “Percolator.” As 
mentioned, Hendricks is an intense 
performer, and to watch her sneer as 
she sings “I am pregnant with mean-
ing / Could it be more appealing?” 
(spoiler: it couldn’t) or her eyes widen 
as she pleads “I’m a mess, I mean in 
the best case / Does he love me most? 
Maybe I don’t come close,” (again, 
spoiler: he doesn’t) is captivating.
As Charly Bliss led up to their 
most anthemic songs, they played 
some new material. Their trademark 
sonic elements were there, but the 
songwriting was a little different. 
Instead of collections of images or 
witty phrases, Hendricks rooted her 
romantic hang-ups in real moments, 
and dove into sincere expressions of 
frustration and sadness. It was pow-
erful, and makes me excited for Char-
ly Bliss’s future releases. 
They ended the show with an 
encore of one of my personal favor-
ites, “Love Me.” It’s a quintessential 
soured love song, and coincidentally, 
the first song off their first release, 
Soft Serve EP. Hendricks sings of a 
lover who frankly sucks, but she can-
not help but blame her own short-
comings for the distance between 
them. The entire song is a capitu-
lation of how intimacy reveals the 
unpleasant elements of your partner 
and — guess what — some unpleas-
ant elements of you, too. And by now, 
Hendricks expects it: “Up above me, 
say you love me / Just a little less / I 
know what happens next.” “Love 
Me,” and numerous other songs in 
Bliss’s catalog, are some of the most 
eloquent expressions of heartbreak 
in music right now. It’ll be exciting to 
see where they go next.

JACK BRANDON
Summer Managing Arts Editor

Tell Me How 
You Really Feel

Mom + Pop Music 

Courtney Barnett

THE MICHIGAN DAILY

MUSIC REVIEW

