B-Side Guys

Popular mythology suggests that finding love solves life’s fundamental problems, that romantic fulfillment provides immunity from ordinary struggles. David Redd’s second full-length album arrives as a deliberate challenge to this comfortable fiction, offering instead a more complex portrait of how profound connection can coexist with persistent uncertainty. Love Is Everything & It Will Not Save You spans 41 minutes and eleven tracks that refuse to separate emotional triumph from everyday difficulty, creating a work that feels both deeply personal and broadly resonant.

The album opens with “(Not All By Itself),” a title that immediately establishes the record’s central thesis. Rather than presenting love as panacea, Redd positions it as catalyst—something that enhances our capacity for dealing with life’s complexities rather than eliminating them. This conceptual framework provides coherence for what follows: a collection that moves freely between genres while maintaining narrative focus on the challenging work of adult relationship building.

Redd’s collaboration with producer Justin Glasco has created soundscapes that mirror the album’s thematic complexity. The production deliberately blends digital and analog elements, creating what Redd describes as “purposefully all over the place” but which functions more accurately as sophisticated collage work. These aren’t arbitrary style shifts; instead, each sonic choice serves the album’s exploration of how love exists within rather than separate from life’s messy realities.

“The End” and “Side Of The Hill” demonstrate the album’s ability to use musical variety as storytelling tool. The former examines how relationships can feel simultaneously beginning and conclusion, while the latter employs perspective—literally positioning the narrator on elevated ground—to examine emotional distance and connection. Redd’s songwriting consistently demonstrates understanding that the most profound insights often emerge from specific, concrete imagery rather than abstract emotional declaration.

The album’s middle section showcases Redd’s genre-fluid approach at its most effective. “Time & Time Again” and “Ash & Smoke” move between folk intimacy and rock expansiveness without feeling scattered or unfocused. Instead, these shifts reflect the record’s central understanding that complex emotional states require varied musical approaches. The arrangements support rather than compete with the lyrics, creating space for Redd’s distinctive voice—simultaneously vulnerable and assured—to carry the narrative weight.

“Somewhere” functions as the album’s emotional centerpiece, directly addressing the geographic displacement that informed much of the record’s creation. Redd’s experience navigating pandemic-era travel restrictions while maintaining long-distance relationship provides specific context for broader questions about home, belonging, and commitment. The track avoids both self-pity and false resolution, instead finding dignity in the simple act of persistence.

The album’s exploration of contemporary masculinity emerges most clearly through “Jitney Bus Blues” and “Slowly Straight to You.” Rather than announcing this theme explicitly, Redd allows it to develop organically through specific situations and choices. His approach to discussing male identity feels particularly refreshing in its refusal to either celebrate or condemn traditional masculine roles, instead examining how contemporary men might navigate changing expectations while maintaining authentic connection.

“What If This Is Good Enough?” represents the album’s most direct confrontation with perfectionist anxiety. The track’s title poses a question that extends beyond romantic relationships to encompass artistic ambition, career satisfaction, and personal growth. Redd’s treatment of this material demonstrates mature understanding that accepting “good enough” requires its own form of courage, particularly in a culture that consistently promotes optimization over contentment.

The album’s sonic variety—spanning rock, folk, hip-hop, jazz, dance music, and soul—never feels like showboating or market research. Instead, these genre explorations serve the record’s examination of how different emotional states require different musical languages. Redd’s description of this approach as “something we used to just call rock & roll” suggests understanding that genre boundaries often limit rather than enhance artistic expression.

The production work throughout maintains remarkable consistency despite the stylistic variety. The session players—with credits including Clairo, Vulfpeck, and Grace Potter—provide foundation that supports Redd’s vision without overwhelming it. The recording approach, combining live band foundation with careful overdub work, creates immediacy that serves the album’s confessional content while maintaining professional polish that ensures repeated listening reveals new details.

“Someday” and “Did You Think It’d Be Easy?” provide appropriate conclusion for the album’s exploration. Rather than offering false resolution or easy answers, these tracks acknowledge that both love and life require ongoing work. The final track’s title directly addresses listener expectations while suggesting that difficulty doesn’t diminish value—if anything, it enhances meaning.

What makes Love Is Everything & It Will Not Save You particularly compelling is its refusal to separate personal narrative from broader cultural observation. Redd’s experience falling in love during early 2020, then navigating international separation during pandemic restrictions, provides specific context for examining how private joy can coexist with public crisis. This approach prevents the album from becoming either purely autobiographical or abstractly universal.

The album succeeds because it understands that the most effective art often emerges from the space between expectation and reality. Redd has created work that honors both the transformative power of love and the persistent difficulty of simply being human. In treating these as complementary rather than contradictory forces, he’s crafted an album that feels both timeless and urgently contemporary.

Love Is Everything & It Will Not Save You establishes Redd as an artist capable of examining complex emotional territory without sacrificing musical accessibility. Most importantly, it offers the kind of honest companionship that makes life’s difficulties feel less isolating, suggesting that shared struggle might be its own form of salvation.