Review by Nina Schirmer
The new Real Friends album, The Home Inside My Head is a gripping, emotional wave for any listener. With their new sophomore album, Real Friends have created even more hard hitting lyrics with songs that capture the feelings of life’s rough patches, all illuminated through their strong, passionate vocals and well thought out instrumentation.
The first track, “Stay in One Place” builds up a lot of excitement for the album with its quick pace, unique backing vocals throughout the chorus, and emotional yet comforting lyrics. “Empty Picture Frames” hooks you as soon as the opening guitars start. In this song we hear references to the album title throughout the lyrics in the chorus as vocalist Dan Lambton sings, “The home inside my head has a bed for me that no one will ever get the chance to see.” Based on the lyrics throughout this song, it seems to be about all of the things that can go through someone’s mind and how no one can ever truly see what someone is going through because they are not inside the person’s head.
The third track on the album, “Keep Lying to Me” has really impressive instrumentation with a slow beautiful breakdown during the bridge. It is easy to visualize a crowd going wild for that specific part of the song during a live performance. The album then shifts to a slower pace and more emotional tone with the song “Scared of Being Alone” followed by a real highlight, “Mokena.” It is one of the more powerful songs on the album with a mix of really strong and soft vocals that strike emotions through every lyric delivered.
The album picks back up with the upbeat and happier song, “Mess.” The song includes the lyrics, “Still a lost boy,” which refers to their song “Lost Boy” off the EP Put Yourself Back Together. Throughout many older Real Friends songs, you would hear the lines “sleepy eyes” and “bony knees” used several times, maintaining a theme that they would try to capture through their music. Throughout The Home Inside My Head, you don’t hear those themes, so it’s nice to see the reference from the song “Lost Boy” and how the theme of being a lost boy is continued.
The seventh track on the album “Isolating Everything” continues the exciting upbeat sounds with some really fun instrumentation through catchy guitar riffs and intense drumming. The next song, “Well, I’m Sorry” is a quicker paced track with lyrics that are at first depressing but then the song becomes more of a hopeful song with the simple lyrics, “It’ll be okay.” “Basement Stairs” and “Door Without a Key” finish off the faster paced songs before the second to last song on the album, “Eastwick.” This track is sung with a lot of emotion that drives the sad lyrics backed with soothing guitar work.
The final song “Colder Quicker” is a lively, energetic track that ends the album in a way that leaves you wanting to listen all over again. The Home Inside My Head is a fantastic album that will definitely not disappoint. It is easy to tell that Real Friends put a lot of personal feelings and genuine hard work into this album, making it one of their best works to date.
Rating: 5/5
Listen to “Mokena”
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