You heard it here first (unless you didn’t): three months in, and Be Your Own Pet have written one of the most unique (and, it must be said, awesome) songs of the year. On “Becky,” from the group’s excellent new record, Get Awkward, Jemina Pearl and the gang have recast the murder ballad in the halls of high school and the sometimes tortured psyche of the female adolescent mind. The verse melody sneakily resembles the enduring dance smash “The Locomotion,” while Jemina hops aboard as she outlines what’s brought us here: girl has a best friend, but the friendship has begun to sour. “I heard you talked a lot of shit about me/ To your new best friend,” Pearl accuses as the accompaniment downslides into the riotous anti-chorus, with the boys in the band insistently shouting “Becky!” as if to hint at the psychotic, murderous delusions the protagonist is set to enter.
Slumber parties, secret crushes, fights at lunch – it’s all tits and teenage angst until the final verse, where Jemina moans about being stuck in “fuckin’ cellblock two,” making good on the chorus’ promise to meet Becky with the protagonist’s new best friend armed with “knives, after class.” She doesn’t sound regretful that she murdered Becky – if anything, she’s a little bitter that she’s stuck in solitary, alone (a double negative if there ever was one). Did the protagonist even have a new friend? Has her adolescent resentment matured into murderous mania?
Complex character studies of teenage abandon, as well as more streamlined vocal and musical arrangements, mark Be Awkward as a decidedly different record from their debut. “Black Hole” plumbs the depths of adolescent ennui (“Breaking glass bottles is oh so fun/ Let’s go and kill someone”) before exhaustedly asking the question that’s on every suburban son and daughter’s minds: “I guess we could go drive around/ But what’s the point?” All this while razor sharp guitars (courtesy of Jonas Stein, who has the uncanny ability to make his singular interplay sound like a hydra of hammer-ons) slash as many melodic constructs as they do wrists. Elsewhere, jealous teenage love gets sexy and serious (“Heart Throb”), drugs are taken (“The Kelly Affair”), affection is begged for (“What’s Your Damage”), and, well, bitches leave (“Bitches Leave”).
Most of the songs on Awkward beg for deeper lyrical analysis, revealing a sly intelligence to BYOP’s age-specific songwriting that didn’t go past “We’re, like, adventurers” on their self-titled debut. The group has also reined in the freewheeling instrumental acrobatics found on that record in favor of tighter arrangements that still pack an equal punch. Let it also be said that Jemina Pearl’s voice has improved in a myriad of ways; throughout Be Awkward, she wails, rally-cries, and (especially on “Becky”) croons with a range of emotions that were bereft in previous recordings.
If there’s one thing Be Awkward has in common with BYOP’s first effort, it’s the fact that it runs a bit long (despite clocking in at 33 minutes and change, no less). There’s more than a couple of tracks that should probably have stayed B-sides, such as “Zombie Graveyard Party” (come on, you guys, you did the zombie thing the last time, too) and “You’re A Waste,” which almost brings the entire record’s momentum to a halt and provides the sole exception to the whole “Jemina can sing now!” deal. Otherwise, drop the needle on Be Awkward, and drop a knife into the chest of the person you hated most in high school; they probably deserve it, and you’ll have a good time.
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