Under The Blacklight by Rilo Kiley
by Lana Fleischli
Lately I’ve been looking back on the music I adored when I was younger, and have begun to see it in a completely new light. The song “Silver Lining” off of Rilo Kiley’s Under The Blacklight was one of those songs for me. I always thought of it as a cheerful song, but it isn't. Frankly, it’s depressing. It’s about heartbreak and pain. It’s about being unhappy in a relationship. However, to my five year old self, it was a song about… I don’t know… colors because of the name? To me, that’s kind of cool! The meaning can change and has changed a lot to me over the years. Jenny Lewis’s songwriting skills make Under The Blacklight a great album.
I wouldn’t say that any of the songs are happy, but they kind of feel that way. The way she sings makes the listener get into the music, but once you listen a bit closer, you realize how dark it is. In the song “Close Call,” Lewis sings in a kind of twangy way that feels a little rough in a wonderful way. The song, while upbeat, is about people trying to get by and make some money, but they have to go about it in risky ways. It’s sad and highlights the lives of people who aren’t protected and are just trying to get by.
The stories in Rilo Kiley’s music reflect the ideas of somewhat dysfunctional people. The song “15” was the one that caught me off-guard the most. “She was bruised like a cherry. Ripe as a peach. How could he have known that she was only 15?” sings Lewis. I think of all of the songs on the album, this one is the most striking and uncomfortable. It sexualizes a 15 year old girl, who has been abused. The guy doesn’t know how old she is. It goes back to the idea of how meaning can change from one listen to the next. It further explains how Under The Blacklight makes the listener take a deeper look at the world around them because they have to take a deeper look into the songs that they are listening to.
In the song, “Give a Little Love,” Rilo Kiley portrays more of these dysfunctional people through relationships in the same way that they do in “Silver Lining;” except in “Give a Little Love,” they do the opposite. In “Silver Lining,” Lewis sings about leaving a relationship that she was unhappy in. In “Give a Little Love,” Lewis sings about basically begging her significant other to just be nice and “Give a Little Love!” I hope I don’t have to be the one to let you know that that is toxic! One shouldn’t have to ask their significant other to care!
All of these ideas about people and relationships are rounded up in the title song “Under The Blacklight.” It’s like being under a blacklight-- all of the impurities are shown. Though one might not relate to being abused at 15, most girls have been sexualized at young ages. A lot of people go through break ups or are in relationships or friendships that are harmful to them. Everyone is dysfunctional in their own ways and this album highlights that by putting us Under The Blacklight.