Change the record: Billie Eilish—Hit Me Hard And Soft

I think of the new crop of modern pop starlets taking up space in our airwaves these days; none of them have had as exciting of a career trajectory as Billie Eilish. Perhaps Olivia Rodrigo comes close, but even with her great music, I never saw that spark of true uniqueness in her like I do with Billie. I say all of this to say, going back to her last two albums, I’ve realized I don’t care too much for her music, at least up until now (a cheeky hint for this review’s views).

Let’s not put the cart before the horse, or indeed the snarky music opinions before the boring history breakdown. Billie Eilish is a California-based popstar who got her start in the late 2010s with moody alternative electropop in her early singles such as “Ocean Eyes” and “Six Feet Under,” as well as her debut EP “Don’t Smile At Me”. These sounds would then be refined into something more experimental and fully realized on her debut studio outing, “When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?”.  My opinion of this album has slowly shifted weirdly over time. While I still respect its ideas and overt weirdness for the genre it was dropped into, it’s not an album I return to often, especially after overplay kicked in. 

Eilish followed up with “Happier Than Ever,” marking a shift into a more mature and less crudely experimental sound. It’s an album with a great deal of hype and successful singles, but it feels like it didn’t quite capture that lightning-in-a-bottle feeling that “When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?” did. Its sound, while a lot more consistent, was consequently far less interesting. That wasn’t to say it left no impact, though, and its sound was certainly setting the groundwork for whatever her next album was going to be, one way or another.

And so we come to her new album here, “Hit Me Hard And Soft,” with probably the most hype around any of her albums yet, at least in the snobbier circles of musicdom. I was certainly curious, especially as it was teased that, just like every new alternative pop album these days, it was going to have a more alt-rock twist. This intrigued me because I always felt Billie’s tone and aesthetic lent itself to that sound extremely well. I went into this record with hopes held high. The moment the album started, I was smacked in the face by Billie’s subtlest and most fragile-sounding foot forward yet with “Skinny”.

It’s a deeply somber and despondent-sounding track, the guitars sounding straight off a Duster record, and Billie’s soft, whispery vocals on the verge of falling apart as she lays bare her deep insecurities.

The alt-rock sound this album advertised turned out to be far different from what I was expecting, leaning more on the softer 90’s bleed-your-heart-out type of sound, with a mix of 2010s-inspired dream-pop and indietronica, as opposed to the rowdy pop punk and pop rock of the ’00s most go for these days. Not to say the album is a full-on somber drive down gray skies ville, with the punkier and more energetic “Lunch” or the groovier sophistic-pop sound of “Birds Of A Feather,” but the album generally leans into the quieter and more subdued much to fantastic effect. 

This can be seen on the track “Chihiro,”  a fantastic piece of indietronica alt-pop that starts off so quiet it almost sounds muffled, like Billie is face down in her pillow, or as the cover shows, falling deep into the water. The syncopated drums and claps and twangy guitar slowly morph the track into this swell of electronic synth wallpapered with wailing background vocals from Billie, feeling like a despondent cry towards the future, before abruptly cutting off into “Birds Of A Feather,” like finally breaking out of that cynical trance. 

The album has a fantastic flow despite somewhat bouncing between tones and sounds. For example, the dancier “Birds Of A Feather” transitions into the soft Mitski-like indie folk of “Wildflower,” which slowly crescendos into a lovely enveloping climax before dying down to let the grayness wash over you like a silent river at night. This is followed by “The Greatest” which also starts with a folkier quiet intro, with what sounds like some lovely harp or sitar before it explodes into a gorgeous medley of synth, guitar, and Billie’s extremely powerful vocals. We also have the 5-minute “L’amour de ma vie,” which beautifully mixes the album’s indie leanings with some traditional jazz-pop. This is bizarrely followed by “The Diner,” a weird pseudo-Britney Spears-ish electro-pop number, which doesn’t fit that well tonally or sonically, but it is a solid number on its own, just a weird track to be shoved between two of the album’s most powerful tracks. 

The next track, “Bittersuite,” is a subtler and odder number, but it finds fantastic beauty in its off-kilter crevices, especially in service of the tone Billie has on the track. The final track on the album,  “Blue,” is another 5-minute cut that plays us off in a progressive mix of indietronica that slowly warps into a beautiful trip-hop by the end, ending the album as somber as it opened.

In my eyes, the album marks a solid line of improvement in both writing and production. Billie has always been a very solid writer at the best of times, but she feels at her most nakedly vulnerable on this record, letting loose all her insecurities and emotional hang-ups, especially on tracks like “Bittersuite”, “Blue” and “Chihiro.” The production is probably the best showcase of Finneas’s talents we’ve had so far, layering each track with gorgeous and subtle instrumentals to perfectly match Billie’s improved vocal talents, both sounding more powerful than ever all throughout.

If you couldn’t tell by this point, then first off, you aren’t very smart— might wanna take up a new position as a state governor—I quite liked this album. It feels like a true step forward for Billie and a brilliantly standout album in this oversaturated modern pop sphere, even if its watery soundscapes can give a bit of fatigue after a while. I have nothing but faith in Billie’s future endeavors, so let’s hope that doesn’t age poorly in the future. By the way, we’re finally putting out reviews again after a summer break, so thanks for reading! Unless you hate this column, then I’m sorry!