Nap Eyes' 'Every Time The Feeling' Is Much Ado About Meaning

There must be some meaning to life if we still have music — it gives form to our existential dread, and sometimes you can dance to it. In just four short years, Nap Eyes have made much ado about meaninglessness with rock 'n' roll songs that shake just offbeat and smart lyrics wrapped in bemused ennui.

I'm Bad Now, the Halifax band's third album, untangles that latter thread further, but with more tightly written songs and stronger musicianship that could hardly be lumped into the "slacker rock" category attached to previous records. "Every Time The Feeling" is the first single, an easygoing tune that boogies like a small booty in tight jeans. Just listen how Nigel Chapman's voice hangs like a poorly wrapped cigarette as he responds to Brad Loughead's flirty guitar leads, especially when he sings, "But you know you can never get away that easy."

It's a little more singles-ready Adventure-era Television than it is Pavement, but Nap Eyes understands that both bands had a way of making a complicated idea simple. Here it opts to repeat the entire song (and Chapman's meditation on "meaninglessness or the negative meaning") to double down on the song's somewhat hopeful conclusion: "But I figured out a way / To get on with my life and to keep on dreaming."

I'm Bad Now comes out March 9 via Paradise Of Bachelors.

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