B-Side Guys

Kerry Charles frames aging as an accumulation of barely perceptible damage, and “Slow Bleeding” becomes his unexpected love song to shared deterioration. Rather than crafting conventional romantic sentiment, he invites his partner to witness his gradual decline—and finds intimacy in that mutual recognition of mortality.

His lyrical approach sidesteps grand romantic gestures in favor of cataloging small defeats: appointment scheduling, insomnia cycles, work presentations that follow sleepless nights. The repeated image of “ten thousand paper cuts” captures how modern life inflicts damage through routine rather than catastrophe. Charles understands that middle age often feels less like dramatic transformation and more like slow-motion erosion.

The production, enhanced by Jake Sherman’s keyboard work, creates sonic luxury around these mundane complaints. Warm synthesizers and laid-back disco rhythms transform domestic anxiety into something approaching sensuality. There’s deliberate irony in how the music’s smoothness contrasts with the lyrical content’s jagged edges—”a pain in my ass” delivered over silk-smooth instrumentation.

Charles’s vocal delivery embodies his stated difficulty with writing straightforward love songs. His invitation to “bleed with me” carries genuine tenderness despite its morbid phrasing. The idea that partnership involves sharing deterioration rather than preventing it suggests a more realistic approach to long-term commitment than typical romantic mythology provides.

What makes “Slow Bleeding” compelling is Charles’s refusal to resolve the tension between life’s gradual damage and love’s sustaining power. Instead, he locates romance in the decision to experience decline together, finding meaning not in avoiding life