Review
The Unlovables
Heartsickle

I first heard The Unlovables on Crafty Record's New York vs. New Jersey Punk Rock Battle Royal compilation. They were one of the bands that didn't blow me away on first listen, but after repeated spins their songs were among my favorite and I quickly picked up Heartsickle, their second full-length.

The Unlovables play mid-90's style pop-punk, featuring powerful female vocals with plenty of catchy hooks and melodic guitar leads. Vocalist Hallie Bullit has a voice that immediately commands attention and is easily recognizable without sounding quite like any other pop-punk vocalist. Their songs have a saccharine and polished sound without veering into the over-produced territory that many mainstream pop-punk bands fall prey to.

Bullit writes about pop-punk staples such as relationship problems and the frustrations associated with growing up, but as a clever lyricist these familiar topics are examined with a witty and personal spin. On "Let's Not Fight" she mourns relationship arguments:

You and I could be out riding bikes / Or record shopping down at generation /

Or rifling through old tapes and CD's / And singing Clash songs at the top of our lungs / Let's not fight / Life's so short there's so much to do

On "Disaster," another standout track, Bullit confronts growing up still immersed in punk rock while peers pursue careers:

You prefer security / I like ambiguity / I don't want to make a plan / I don't want a minivan / And you don't understand it / But it's working out ok for me /

I don't ask why you spend eight / Hours a day at a job you hate / I'm not pointing my finger / At you and your high blood pressure / And neither of us knows if we'll regret / The choices that we've made

Ideally, I would have trimmed this album down to ten or eleven tracks, as "Have You Ever?" and "No Way" fall a little flat and result in a slight drag toward the end. With that said, it is a minor criticism of an album otherwise packed with infectious songs. Heartsickle serves to further establish The Unlovables at the forefront of the current pop-punk revival. As someone who lived through the initial pop-punk explosion and had The Queers, Screeching Weasel, and Tilt on constant rotation, I highly recommend giving this album a spin if you currently or used to love pop-punk. The Unlovables will likely be one of the bands reminisced about and recommended to younger generations when this era of pop-punk concludes.