I'm Bad Now

I'm Bad Now feels as much a modest masterpiece as Spring Hill Fair or Tigermilk. [Apr 2018, p.32]

I’m Bad Now is another reliable slab from Nap Eyes, with stronger melodies and more consistency across the board.

Yet as disjointed as Nap Eyes’ free-associations can be, they capture a vivid part of life, the drifting area where you’ve acquired adult freedoms but adult focus still dangles out of reach.

I'm Bad Now may be billed as a closing chapter in their first act, but Nap Eyes give the feeling that their narrative will continue on indefinitely.

Moving forward from that meandering pace [on 2016's Thought Rock Fish Scale], I'm Bad Now finds Nap Eyes picking up their feet a bit, without sacrificing the subtle psychedelia that makes their songs so enticing.

I’m Bad Now is a more forthright, steady-going listen than Thought Rock Fish Scale, and, on first pass, it seems a touch less enchanting than that record’s nocturnal reveries. The new album shows Nap Eyes can certainly excel at tight, snappy power-pop (check the incisive opener “Every Time the Feeling”). But there are also all-too-brief flashes of viscerality that you wish the band had explored further.

Personal taste will determine whether that's a good or bad thing. As, production aside, Chapman's still coming at modern dissatisfaction, alienation, and general self-loathing from a familiar and oddly reassuring place.

I'm Bad Now delivers throughout its 11, mostly restrained pieces in a way that highlights Chapman's exquisite prowess for astute observational prose.

The results are largely impressive, particularly on the fragile country of Follow Me Down, but you can't help feeling that eventually Nap Eyes will need to look to more distant horizons to maintain everyone's interest. [Apr 2018, p.112]

I'm Bad Now finds Nap Eyes somewhere in between their two former releases.