Sombr – Undressed

Mediocr – Unimpressed… 

[Video]
[3.93]

Dave Moore: I’ve been working toward a workable definition of what I call windowpane, the uncanny valley between indie rock and adult contemporary that is the decades-long result of convergence between mainstream pop and indie, which you can read about here if you’re into that sort of thing. There aren’t a ton of men doing windowpane, but this isn’t a very useful statistic because there aren’t a ton of men really doing anything in pop right now that isn’t post-AmIdol butt-croon. If sombr is any indication, there’s no reason for more men not to get in on it. He seems to be doing pretty well! 
[6]

Hannah Jocelyn: I was out with two musicians and my partner at the time, and we kept Shazaming the music — I slowly realized this dreamy kind of sound has become pro forma for any band starting out in the same way as stomp-clap in the early 10s or sapphic folk in the early 20s. While this doesn’t not remind me of faux-indie mainstays like Fitz and the Tantrums and the Neighbourhood, it mostly feels like a streamlined version of of what TSJ contributor Dave Moore calls Windowpane and I call Yearncore; essentially a toned-down version of the shoegaze revival mixed with a a deorientationalized variation on that wistful, earnest singer-songwriter mode (Phoebe Bridgers’ producer Tony Berg is on this track). The more I listen, the more I hear something vaguely 60s about the wall of sound, and that’s when it clicked: “Undressed” is not exactly timeless in the classic sense, but it would have been pretty good in the 60s, pretty good in the 80s, and pretty good in the 10s, so it’s pretty good now. In fact, some parts are better than pretty good! I love that Sombr visits his Mothr post-breakup, even if that’s probably just a throwaway filler line, and while I’m mostly sick of Windowpane, it perfectly captures the exhaustion of starting from scratch. 
[6]

Iain Mew: There is a diabolical genius at work in taking the airy stomp-clap offshoot best typified by Vance Joy’s “Riptide” and combining it with the fevered jealous imaginings of “Mr. Brightside”. Only doubled up, because he sees a gleam missing from her eyes and starts picturing them both with other people! Where it goes wrong is in missing the importance of “Mr. Brightside” being entirely in urgent present tense outside of one inciting kiss. “Undressed” switches back and forth between tenses oddly, and when the second verse reaches “I took the train to see my mother”, its gloomy banality takes away the possibility of the narrative working as psychodrama. That turns the bit about his partner’s future children with another man from a momentary intense delusion to a long-held outlook on life, and it’s really creepy. 
[1]

Jel Bugle: A lot of things remind me of “Somebody That I Used To Know,” not a song I especially like — he even looks like a gawky Gotye. I feel that he may be overly concerned with the physical aspects of relationships and that this could be part of his problem, but what do I know? I’m sure this will be a big hit: his voice is okay, and he’s got the look. A sketchy [6].
[6]

Julian Axelrod: Perfectly fine post-post-The Neighbourhood stream pop with a weird anti-stepchild twist? In Sombr’s defense, he was born the same year Cheaper by the Dozen 2 came out.
[5]

Katherine St. Asaph: I can only assume “Undressed” is a Republican Party psyop to make traditional masculinity sound good by comparison.
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Kayla Beardslee: Have you ever wondered, “What would it sound like if Brandon Flowers sung ‘Somebody That I Used to Know?'” I haven’t, actually, but I guess the result is passable.
[6]

Tim de Reuse: Rhyming “mother” with “another” – yeah, whatever. Rhyming “mother” with “another” with “lover” – okay, I think that you think you’re being cute, but as long as you stick the dismount it might work out.  Rhyming “mother” with “another” with “lover” with “suffer” – I’m hitting the eject button. My fight-or-flight has activated. I need to go take a walk.
[5]

Mark Sinker: I like the holes in my sweater, just a silly thing to say about me. Unremarkable emotion from a querulous baby. 
[2]

Ian Mathers: Does the intro here and some other bits remind anyone else of “Somebody That I Used to Know”? Weird that it happened twice, huh. Just reinforces my belief that Doechii figured out a better way to work with the sample than most. This isn’t bad (some of the lyrics scream “I have very little life experience” but that’s fine! young people need music too) but most of the distinctiveness is, uh, the bit that reminds me of a better song.
[6]

Leah Isobel: Insipidly written, badly-sung drivel for the most part – which is, of course, no crime. But that “children of another man” line, wedged clumsily into the rhythm and wailed against a sudden chord progression shift, comes off as some real incel shit: here is my vulnerability. Take pity and fuck me. No thank you!
[2]

Taylor Alatorre: “I don’t want the children of another man / To have the eyes of the girl I won’t forget” may just be the single most disgusting lyric I have ever heard in a top 40 song. Along with the rest of “Undressed,” it still holds some value as a window into a very particular post-adolescent yearning for adult complexity, for a misery more profound and meaningful and hauntingly complete than any yet known. Such literary overreaches may indeed be worth of study, but preferably from a distance with all subject names redacted.
[2]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: In a lyric otherwise characterized by deep, almost anonymous vagueness (“you’re saying to me what you’re saying to me”?) there’s something jarringly specific about the bit in the bridge where he sings about not wanting “the children of another man to have the eyes of the girl I won’t forget.” He really puts himself into the line, too, drawing out that “forget” until it takes on a load-bearing status in the song. Unfortunately, it’s a terrible line — an ugly sentiment, expressed with neither grace or self-awareness. In five years, I will probably not remember this song. If I do, it’ll be for the kids’ eyes thing!
[4]

Claire Davidson: I’m sorry, but in a world where “Sweater Weather” is the 7th most-streamed song on Spotify (?!), you cannot root your song in a robust bass line, drench your voice in reverb, and open your first verse with a couplet that references “the holes in your sweater”—and, to make matters worse, rhyme said lyric with the homophone “whether” immediately after the fact. The Neighbourhood’s brand of detached, desaturated “indie” rock looks much worse on “undressed,” though, as vocalist sombr’s palpable desperation to reunite with an ex clashes horribly with the monotonous sonic palette surrounding him, stripping his whinging of any of the drama necessary to be at all engaging.
[4]

Nortey Dowuona: This would be a 8 if it was live. It’s not.
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