There’s a comforting feeling in Jade Lilitri’s voice that everything can turn out to be okay. Much like a warm embrace through the speakers, Oso Oso have returned with their latest studio effort titled Life Till Bones. Lilitri opens the band’s fifth album with “Many Ways,” a somber reminder of mortality as he still grapples with the loss of his past guitarist, Tavish Maloney. The opening lyrics of, “I love you, but life is a gun / Do you remember when you used to have fun? / Keep in my mind when you turn to run / There are no ‘directions’, there is only one,” are well-crafted and hit their intended tone as each piano key echoes in the mix. The production on this LP by Billy Mannino is top notch throughout, and he puts the right emphasis on each lyric, guitar chord, and percussion to get the most out of each track. Oso Oso are the kings of lo-fi emo rock and they wear their crowns proudly on Life Till Bones.
After the opening statement, the record accelerates with my favorite song in the set, “The Country Club,” as Lilitri explains in the chorus, “I, I’ve got a lot to apologize for / Oh Caroline, she can’t rely on me… / And amongst the list of things I should say to you / Oh Caroline, that’s more words than I can afford lately.” The steady beats by drummer Jordan Krimston backed with the dual-guitar attack from Lilitri/Eddy Rodriguez make for a standout song early in the sequencing. “All Of My Love” follows naturally after and features a brief call-back to the opening song with the lyrics of, “Annie’s got her gun now and she’s pointing it at me / I don’t know where I went wrong but we sure had a lot of fun.” Lilitri adds in a killer bass line in the bridge to keep the track pulsating along.
”That’s What Time Does” invites the listener deeper into the world of Oso Oso and features a memorable hook of, “And you let out this little sigh / Both of us lined up eye to eye / I’m laying across the floor from you / You said, ‘I need a little more from you’.” The way that Lilitri sees the world, and his relationships, paint a picture of a person understanding the nuances of the importance of a human connection. “Stoke” rocks along with a fairly simplistic beat from Krimston, while Lilitri continues to make things interesting with his vocal performance going from a standard croon to a falsetto with ease.
”Dog Without Its Bark” sets a cool vibe with it’s intricate guitar work that feels like a chill trip to the beach as Lilitri fills in the details with a laid back attitude. It’s one of the strongest songs in the set, and you can tell that Oso Oso are no strangers to calculated artistic expression. Things take a brief detour back to the somber feelings found on “Seesaw,” while “Application” is a mid-tempo track that steadily accelerates in the chorus and features some vibrant instrumentation between the vocals.
The cool, pick-me-up beat found on “Skippy” allows for Life Till Bones to feature plenty of varied styles and tempos as Lilitri sings, “My island ain’t much like it used to be / Lately my focus is tightening with each day, less shaky / I wanted to show you who I see inside me / But you beat me to it, god how did you find me?” Later in the song, Lilitri sings with a similar cadence to 90’s one-hit wonder New Radicals on the line of “I got all that I need living in this mystery with you.” The album closer of “Other People’s Stories” starts out with a bellowing vocal delivery from Lilitri and adds context to the album title with the lyrics of “Look at all the people, looking at their phones / With how much time left? Life till bones.”
This cohesive statement found on Life Till Bones finds Oso Oso in an all-time great album run that started with The Yunahon Mixtape and still continues here. Jade Lilitri and his bandmates are quickly accelerating as tremendous songwriters with unique perspectives on the world around us as they observe through their lenses. By being detailed observers of everything around them, while simultaneously creating new art, Oso Oso continue to impress on a record worthy of all the accolades.