B-Side Guys

The first two verses of “Growing Pains” move in familiar emotional territory: lost years, the world passing by, purpose gone vague. Then the song shifts into a series of direct addresses and the specificity changes everything. “Dear mom I’m sorry I’m not what you thought.” “To my friends I’m sorry that I’m never around.” “To my dad I know that I’m a disappointment.” The apology tour structure turns a song about vague drift into something with named recipients and actual stakes.

The North Carolina band cites Citizen, Arm’s Length, Basement, and Hot Mulligan as touchstones, and “Growing Pains” earns those reference points in the way it handles emotional weight without aestheticizing it. The post-hardcore and emo influences are present in the arrangement’s patience during the first half and its escalation past the 2:23 mark, where the track gets heavier in a way that mirrors the lyric’s movement from self-pity toward something rawer.

The self-address is the sharpest section: “to myself, what the fuck were you even thinking / all your ships sailed now you’re stuck here sinking.” That pivot from external apologies to internal confrontation gives the song its teeth. The attachment theory reference that follows, “my attachment type’s avoidant / but I can’t avoid it,” lands with the wry self-awareness that the best emo writing achieves when it’s being honest rather than performative.

As the first song ever,ending wrote as a full band, “Growing Pains” announces what kind of band they intend to be: one willing to say the uncomfortable thing directly rather than letting the distortion carry it.