Tarric Confronts the Quiet Collapse on “Lying With You”

It’s easy to talk about love when everything is going right. Tarric ’s new single “Lying With You” is about what happens when it all quietly falls apart—and you stay anyway.

Built on glimmering synth textures and hollowed-out percussion, the track is emotionally raw but musically composed, like a breakup conversation in a perfectly curated gallery space. Tarric doesn’t scream through the pain—he whispers it with precision. “You make me say things I would not do / Cause I’ve been lying with you,” he sings, peeling back the layers of emotional self-distortion that creep into relationships like mold under wallpaper.

This isn’t a revenge song or a dramatic farewell. It’s a self-inventory. A reckoning.

That kind of maturity isn’t new to Tarric, but it’s more distilled than ever. While his debut album Lovesick danced through infatuation and its collapse, Method seems like the inevitable chapter two: disillusionment, clarity, survival. “Lying With You” sets that tone like a cracked mirror—beautiful, fractured, and reflective.

Raised on a diet of The Smiths and Depeche Mode in the American Midwest, Tarric’s taste for melodic melancholy has always been clear. But it’s his ability to adapt those influences into something relevant—and resonant—that sets him apart from his contemporaries. After moving to Los Angeles with barely enough to survive, he built his world from scratch: working behind the scenes at NBC and Fox by day, sculpting his sonic identity by night.

The visual strength of his work, evidenced in videos that landed on MTV, isn't just a bonus. It's a core part of the equation. Tarric makes music that feels like film—romantic, atmospheric, precise.

“Lying With You” carries all that cinematic weight, but without ever feeling overproduced. It feels lonely in the right ways. Uncomfortable in the real ways. And in a world of over-engineered indie pop, Tarric has carved out a lane where vulnerability is the flex.

The Emotional Depth of Chalumeau’s Special Release “My Hands Are Tied”

It’s easy to be skeptical of academic types who pivot to pop music. Too often, the result feels overthought, underfelt — a sonic dissertation no one asked for. But Chalumeau, the project of Brown University professors Katherine Bergeron and Butch Rovan, sidesteps this trap with startling grace. On “My Hands Are Tied,” they deliver something intimate, unflinching, and quietly devastating.

The song’s strength is in its paradox. The narrator claims emotional detachment, but the music says otherwise. Rovan’s arrangement leads with a kind of polished tension — guitar lines that sound like questions without answers — and Bergeron’s vocals play the role of a narrator who’s not as in control as she wants to be. It’s all the more powerful because it doesn’t try to overwhelm you. Instead, it lingers, like the memory of a conversation that never got finished.

You can hear the weight of history here. The song originated years ago, written by Rovan at a time when the idea of their relationship was still just a theory. Since then, it’s evolved — not just lyrically, but emotionally. There’s a lived-in quality to it now, a fragility that can’t be faked. It’s the sound of people who know what it means to hold back, and what it costs.

The accompanying music video captures that internal conflict with cinematic clarity: a woman on a train, haunted by what she’s left behind, revisiting memories that are both beautiful and corrosive. It’s not nostalgia, but longing with no resolution.

It’s the kind of song that rewards headphones and repeat listens — quiet, intimate, and full of things you don’t catch the first time. If this is what Chalumeau is bringing to their debut album, Blue, then we may be witnessing the emergence of a new kind of indie band — one that’s less about the scene and more about the soul.

Stages of Self: Calyn’s “Better Left Unsaid” Walks the Fine Line Between Vulnerability and Control

Calyn ’s debut EP Better Left Unsaid arrives not with grandiosity but with poise. The Stockton-based artist, whose sound is shaped by the textured minimalism of Alternative R&B, carefully unveils six tracks that read like unsent letters—each one hovering in that liminal space between confession and silence. She doesn’t overreach. Instead, she picks her moments, capturing the kind of quiet pain that rarely makes it into pop.

Rather than pushing for a dramatic arc, Better Left Unsaid unfolds like a diaristic exploration of grief—not in the traditional sense, but grief as it shows up in relationships, identity, and the long, private aftermath of heartbreak. Calyn herself notes the EP mirrors the five stages of grief, and the structure makes that interpretation hard to ignore. But rather than ticking emotional boxes, she lets each song bleed into the next, using restraint as its own form of expression.

The opener, “Eleven 03,” uses lateness as a metaphor for disconnection. There’s nothing explosive about the track, and that’s what gives it weight. The beat is sparse, with space to breathe between lyrics that feel more observed than narrated. Calyn resists the urge to assign blame or solution. That detachment isn’t numbness—it’s recognition that some emotional dynamics are too tangled for clarity.

“What If?” follows with a kind of spiraling internal logic. The song—written during a period of rumination—poses questions but avoids offering closure. This isn’t a narrative with a tidy conclusion; it’s a song that captures what it feels like to lose confidence in your emotional compass. The production is pared down to let her voice guide the tension, which never quite resolves.

The most historically grounded track here is “Sliding Thru The City,” one she reportedly held onto for years. Co-produced with her sister DYLI and Ruwanga, it captures the inertia of a relationship stuck in loops—too messy to stay, too familiar to leave. It’s sleek but unpolished, a choice that serves the song’s themes. Where many artists would chase a bigger hook, Calyn leans into atmosphere, letting the song exist in the space between longing and fatigue.

“Only Me Interlude” is the EP’s emotional pivot. With unprocessed vocals and no attempt at polish, it feels like a moment caught on tape rather than something crafted. That vulnerability doesn’t come across as performative. It feels lived in. In an era where emotional transparency is often monetized, this track feels unguarded by comparison.

The closer, “make u miss me,” reframes the narrative arc. It doesn’t carry triumph or vengeance—it’s about withdrawal. The production is more refined here, but the emotional register is still muted. She’s not looking back, and she’s not asking for recognition. She’s stepping out, without noise.