It’s a gut-punching song that doesn’t dwell on drama but carries a shrugged delivery. He’s hoping for a time when he can get back to feeling like himself and realizing there is another challenge ahead. “Tilden sings about longingly staring at his phone, hoping for any connection, and of feeling the dread of impending medical debt. That’s where the closer, “Windows” comes in. Sure, things may be better, but even though the intense moments of the experience and the well-wishes have gone, things aren’t over. The record eventually points to a specific and often overlooked aspect to health scares – the financial burden and recovering from isolation. As it comes to a close, his relaxed guitar turns to a sharp screech as he repeats, “ forget it / it isn’t giving up, it isn’t giving in. He’s confronting the bitter truth that he is the only one who can truly know what he’s going through, and outside judgments are inherently skewed. The song is a rare slow burn and finds Tilden singing “ we can’t get along ” in a way that feels like he’s swaying from side to side. After spending so many songs gesturing to what he went through, it feels like a relief to hear him say “ throwing out my meds today / I don’t wanna feel like shit ”. That is until we reach “Forget It,” the moment the composure falls and Tilden’s frustration finally peaks through. Still, every one of these feels powerful and masked by poeticism. Tilden’s lyrical style is distinct-his songs are made up of a few lines and act more like repeating a mantra than telling a story. He alludes to that revelation on the title track-“ I can’t wait for change, it eats at my veins / so give me the stage where this bull can rage.” The line feels like the moment he realizes that nothing was stopping him besides himself. What becomes clear as the album progresses, though, is that Tilden knows where his friends have gone, and the answer is nowhere. “Skip” touches on self-destruction, and our inclination to run away from problems rather than confront them. “Backseat Driver,” armed with its whining, jangly guitar, eschews unwanted advice. Each track feels built around an aspect of the healing Tilden had to do physically and emotionally during the record’s creation.
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Where Have All My Friends Gone? is grand, full of sweeping synths and vocal effects deployed as if to obfuscate the weight of his words. The record follows a general narrative as Tilden explored his feelings after a health scare left him cut off from those close to him. Where Have All My Friends Gone? his third full length, meditates on that very question. Home > Album Review: BOYO – ‘Where Have All My Friends Gone?’ Album Review: BOYO – ‘Where Have All My Friends Gone?’īOYO, the project of Robert Tilden, makes washed out, psych-tinged indie rock that feels like an offshoot of Elvis Depressedly or early Alex G.