“It’s unattractive for me to burden you with shame,” sings Alicia Bognanno about halfway through “Lucky For You”, her fourth album as Bully. She shouts the line with the kind of exhaustion and straightforwardness that we come to expect from Bully. With 2020’s “Sugaregg”, Bognanno turned her band into a solo project and pushed onward with a blurry collection of cathartic, tired songs. Three years later, Bognanno picks up where she left off with “Lucky For You”, It’s another strong collection of anthemic post-grunge that doubles as Bully’s poppiest record so far. But this album’s catchiness runs contrary to Bognanno’s strongest suit, which is writing about varying forms of disappointment. Bognanno has always been an expert at pairing her chagrin to fuzzy rock songs, but “Lucky For You” likely has some of her most muscular tunes yet. In the explosive, shouted chorus of “Hard to Love,” the catchy bass lick of “How Will I Know,” and the pummelling drum intro of “Days Move Slow,” Bognanno clearly wants the smouldering, crunching textures of this record to ring out in the listener’s memory.
Between images of black holes, shades of blue, and pledges to “never get fucked up again,” the most memorable thing here is her intensifying honesty and lyrical dexterity. Bognanno’s writing for Bully has always sat atop the balance of visceral and ephemeral.
On “Lucky For You”, that tightrope balance is a beautiful achievement.
The Fat Angel Sings 