EP REVIEW: BILLIE EILISH - GUITAR SONGS
Billie Eilish - Guitar Songs
Billie Eilish is here with a new EP, comprising of two acoustic ballads, in the same light as Your Power and listen before i go.
Track I: TV
This track is extraordinary, featuring a paired back instrumental that is driven by simple acoustic chords, however it feels much rawer than Your Power, Billie's earth-shattering acoustic ballad from her previous album, Happier Than Ever. Notably, in this song Billie sound far from happy, as this track exhibits traits of existentialism, with lines such as "I'll Stay in the pool and drown" and "What's the point of anything?", in this track, Billie also makes reference to having an Eating Disorder, something she has referenced before in the track Male Fantasy.
There is a loose narrative to this track, Billie wants to sit and watch TV, with TV being a fairly obvious metaphor encapsulating escapism, she wants to escape, because someone, possibly a lover, is mad at her.
In this cut you can also find brief lines about Roe vs Wade and the Johnny Depp case, at the end of verse two. However after that verse, the heartbreaking chorus enters, where Billie says:
Now all of my friends are missing again
'Cause that's what happens when you fall in love
You don't have the time, you leave them all behind
And you tell yourself, "It's fine, you're just in love"
This expands upon the themes of isolation and escapism, in this track Billie has deserted all her friends, to pursue the person she is in love with.
However this track culminates in the outro, where Billie repeatedly sings the refrain "Maybe I, Maybe I'm The Problem", before resolving with the line, "Baby I, Baby I'm The Problem". This is Billie realizing that it's not the fact that she is in love causing her to lose touch with her friends, maybe it's her fault.
Track II: The 30th
Following TV is the second and final track, The 30th, where Billie delves wholeheartedly into storytelling, over this sparse acoustic guitar, allowing for her voice to shine. And these lyrics, tell what I can only assume is a true story, about someone she knows getting involved in a car accident. In the first verse she sings:
Sometimes, you look the same
Just like you did before the accident
When you're starin' into space
It's hard to believe you don't remember it
Woke up in the ambulance
You pieced it all together on the drive
This is an amazing intro, it introduces the themes while still providing intrigue, yet it doesn't feel calculated, it feels raw.
Next, Billie delivers verse two in a stream-of-conscious style, which aids itself very well to this track, she sings:
In a standstill on the 5
Thought it was unusually early traffic
Usually, I don't panic
I just wanted to be on time
When I saw the ambulances on the shoulder
I didn't even think of pullin' over
I pieced it all together late that night
These lyrics read like poetry, and paint a beautiful picture of the scene.
Finally, in the bridge, Billie continues the stream-of-consciousness by singing:
What if it happened to you on a different day?
On a bridge where there wasn't a rail in the way?
Or a neighborhood street where the little kids play?
Or the Angeles Crest in the snow or the rain?
What if you weren't alone? There were kids in the car
What if you were remote? No one knows where you are
If you changed anything, would you not have survived?
You're alive, you're alive, you're alive
This bridge sees Billie reflecting on the fragility of the situation, how one small factor could have changed everything, but this gives her gratitude, because out of all these possible outcomes, the person she is singing about, possibly the lover referenced in the first track, is alive.
Overall, I would love to see Billie expand on this storytelling more, possibly over more paired back instrumentation, or maybe Billie could adopt a character for an album, similar to what Bowie did for Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane.
This EP is amazing, highly reccomend
9.0/10
https://genius.com/albums/Billie-eilish/Guitar-songs
https://genius.com/Billie-eilish-tv-lyrics
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