Lately I Feel Everything
Album by Willow
Released 16 July 2021
Pop-Punk / Alternative Rock
Produced by Willow / Tyler Cole
Rating – 6.5/10
Willow uses the nostalgia of pop-punk to conquer the pitfalls of young adulthood on her latest album.
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I’d always known Travis Barker to collaborate with hip hop and electronic artists, so it was no surprise to hear that he’d teamed up with Willow Smith on a number of tracks. Little did I know this partnership had occurred to suit the most well-known efforts of Travis rather than Willow.
That’s right, ‘Lately I Feel Everything’ is primarily a pop-punk album, with emo and other alt nuggets utilised to boot. That revelation wasn’t a total surprise; since her late teens, Willow has been fairly experimental in relation to her music – despite scoring a bubblegum pop hit with ‘Whip My Hair’ in 2010, her career has been fuelled by the thought of keeping listeners on their toes.
In South California, born and raised, with her mother she spent most of her days. Observing rock music’s relationship in the pop sphere, Willow’s memories of Jada Pinkett Smith’s Wicked Wisdom serve as the majority of the inspiration behind the core sound of ‘Lately I Feel Everything’; a nostalgia she associates with a childhood, not necessarily pleading “take me back”, but rock definitely feels like a comfort to Willow as she transitions into an obstacle-dodging young adult.
Strained relationships and distrust fuel Willow’s fire, particularly as the skit-like ‘Fuck You’ simply sees the singer roar “fuck you for fucking up my heart” as Matt Chamberlain plays the drums badly. I get it, when I was her age, I probably wanted to scream simple statements like that, but luckily much of the rest of the album is far more mature and artistically-minded.
Willow uses a bruising bass-vocal melody combo on ‘Don’t Save Me’ as she clings to her independency and pride. A rising hill of mucky distortion swarms as she reaches a breaking point, though she calms down to pick apart the world’s flaws on following track ‘Naïve’, all through a teary lens as she builds to a momentous cry of “I need you to tell me when I’m being naïve / ‘cause I know I can be”. It’s the album’s most heartfelt moment, which is saying something.
Heavy metal flashbacks jump rope with Willow’s anxiety on ‘Lipstick’, with each jump resulting in an earth-shattering impact, formed by crushing guitars and drums. Similar are the kaboom-like riffs of ‘Breakout’, though they’re a little ham-fisted and dangerous-by-design without allowing any extra punch.
The gloomy riff of ‘Xtra’ is far more concerning, as are Willow and Tierra Whack’s echoey vocals. Willow already has a killer voice, but on ‘Come Home’, she reminds me of the modern equivalents of the early-2000s radio rock/punk sound she often guns for, namely Lili Trifilio of Beach Bunny, and to a lesser extent Marissa Paternoster of Screaming Females.
Those pop-punk exploits reach many dramatic peaks. ‘Grow’ was definitely written with Willow’s influences in mind; it’s the most Blink-182-reminiscent cut, and even Avril Lavigne makes an appearance, almost to the point of gimmicking. The song also contains the line “you’ll find that you’re your own best friend, and no that ain’t a fucking metaphor”, and I’m not really sure what the implied metaphor actually is.
The album’s earlier helpings of pop-punk are far more adept and tolerable. Travis Barker acts as a guiding light as the smooth, hooky ‘Transparent Soul’ kicks the album off with “hey hey” cheers, heaps of melody, hard beats from Barker and effective rap-singing from Willow.
But ‘Gaslight’ might be that bit better. Willow just goes for it, unleashing from the starting pistol as a wing-stretching chord progression races alongside pacy drums and summery guitar licks. The lyrics are actually far more grown-up than those that would’ve occurred on a turn-of-the-century pop-punk single.
Those lyrics might be the only individual spin Willow puts on the genre, though it’s not like pop-punk is the only subcategory of rock that appears on ‘Lately I Feel Everything’, and hell, it’s pretty nifty right now, so if Willow can flesh out her approach, we could get an even better version of this in the future.
While in the past I have been intrigued by the stylistic exploration of the Smith children, ‘Lately I Feel Everything’ might be the most excited I’ve been made to feel by either. Taking on a new style of music with its own expectations with this much grace is impressive – take that, Machine Gun Kelly!
Best tracks – ‘Transparent Soul’ – ‘Gaslight’.
Weakest tracks – ‘Fuck You’ – ‘Grow’ – ‘Breakout’.
Rating – 6.5 out of 10
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