ALBUM REVIEW: Still Blank - Still Blank (Deluxe)

Brooke Dougherty
10 hours ago
4 min read

Still Blank's Still Blank (Deluxe) Is a Genre-Swirling Journey Between Awake and Asleep.

Black dog walking across gray pavement, seen from above, with a calm, focused posture. — Album Artwork for Still Blank Deluxe Album | Album Artwork by Rachel Goldberg

Article Contributed by Brooke Dougherty.

Still Blank’s Debut Album Is a Cinematic Experience

It’s hard to believe that this is Still Blank’s first album. After having a fateful meeting in Liverpool in 2022, the transatlantic duo of Jordy (Kauaʻi, Hawaii) and guitarist Ben (Manchester, UK) released their debut album in 2025. Adding “love/guilt” and “Fever Dream,” Still Blank (Deluxe) expands the original release into a 12-song, 44-minute journey through mental pressure, restlessness, identity, isolation, and the existential experience of being human.

The Soundtrack for Golden Hour; Windows Down

The deluxe album begins, now with “love/guilt” as the hazy, cinematic opener. It pulls the listener in with its airy, dreamy, introspective vocals, but grounds them with the grungy guitar riffs that root them in the story.

“Did I do it for you? Or do it for myself? I wish that we could talk about it, but I'm not sure it would help.”

Singer and multi-instrumentalist Jordy laments a breakdown in communication between two people and the accompanying guilt of staying in a relationship they have outgrown.

“I was just a kid and lost in fairytales of flowers and white doves. Stuck around for half my life, but I’m not sure that’s love.”

What About Jane, Still Blank’s psychedelic, Jane Birkin-inspired track transports us back to the 1960s with its nod to the Velvet Underground.

It feels like an atmospheric Bond girl anthem.

Despite its ability to whisk you away, Still Blank (Deluxe) delivers an uneasy lyrical experience. It recounts the rawness of living. Ain’t Quite Right crashes on the scene, guiding you into a dream-like state full of turmoil and unease that continues to build.

“I lay down, I watch her breathe. My senseless lamb of ecstasy. I’d peel your mind and snatch all of your dreams.”

Songs like Dead & Gone feel like a breath of fresh air in the aftermath of entanglement. Reminiscing in the early morning light on getting out alive. Clinging to the pieces of yourself you were able to salvage.

“I was only yours for a moment but I’ll forever be my own.”

Jody sings with conviction. And the chorus hits even harder.

“I am a woman. You’re no man.”

A biting critique of lopsided power structures and sexism in the music industry, Get Over It refuses to look away from the way women are dehumanized.

“Step on me and pretend nothing ever happenеd. Mary, cover it up. But she’s coverеd in blood.”

Pulsating between a dream-like state and raw, disjointed vulnerability, songs like Sundown Dialogue ground the listener again with its warbly acoustic musings on getting back to the basics of what you know.

“I wanna fall, wanna feel like a kid again. Drink the sun into my insides, it’s in my skin.

The fast-paced riff on Same Sun brings more restless momentum paired with lyrical hopeful moments.

A reminder that no matter how isolated you feel, everybody is connected under the same sun.

Vacancy pulls us back into a daze of reaching for what once was. The shell of the past haunting your every waking moment but you aren’t ready to let go.

“Your mind’s a vacant terrastone. Nobody knows just where you go. Could I come rest beside your bones?”

Denial leans into folk without ever settling there.

Vocals ring clear backed by eerie guitar melodies, hazy harmonies, and lyrics that almost sound like an ancient spell.

“A tidal wave, a shipwrecked sea. A plastic island man made beach. To throw away what he had known. Trade in new fins for flesh and bone.”

Fever Dream is a melodic mirage of a song. The layered, echoey instrumentation makes you feel like you’re lost in a long hallway. It’s perfectly disjointed in all the right places, while Cut Slack brings us back to the grunge basics.

Rainman concludes the album as the perfect outro. Stripped-back instrumentation, twangy strings, gently shaking the listener from a trance.

“Throwing all your ego away and laughing ‘til the pit of your ribs start burning. No need to have something to say. So why don’t we stay right here on the ground now.

A reminder once again that as life rushes all around us, sometimes all we need is simply just to be.

“Spin the missile. My fear is my love. Everything means nothing at all. Spin the missile. Night fades, morning comes. I'm here and I'm gone. I'm here, I'm gone.”

It’s Cool, It’s Eclectic, It Leaves Us Wanting More

Still Blank (Deluxe) lives up to its immersive, genre-swirling reputation reminiscent of psychedelic, folk, indie rock, art pop, and shoegaze. It’s gritty, it’s grungy, and raw. But it’s also hypnotic, dreamy, and nostalgic. If you like the distorted riffs and rock fuzz of the Silversun Pickups and the psychedelic intimacy of the melancholic vocals of Angel Olsen, this is the album for you.

For a Debut Album, It’s Perfectly Imperfect

FINAL VERDICT: 9.5/10

Still Blank (Deluxe) delivers a raw and cosmic sound that can only come from a band that isn’t trying to be something they’re not. The kind of music you close your eyes for and start to feel it in your body. The warmth and clarity of the vocals meld together with the restless, layered pulse of the music. Somewhere between awake and asleep, nostalgia and reality, that’s where Still Blank invites you to go.