Goody Grace is the perfect embodiment of the modern pop-star; a child of the internet generation that isn’t afraid to give the middle-finger to genre rules and just make the kind of music that feels genuine at the moment. Already boasting tours with the likes of Hoodie Allen and LANY and collaborating with Jesse Rutherford of the Neighbourhood, Goody Grace has already found his lane in the kind of scatter-brained pop that has made its way to radion, a fact that was made clear when he stated his influences range from Blink-182 to Johnny Cash to his peers and long-time friends, Gnash and Lil Aaron, both of which make an appearance on the recently released Infinite EP.
On “Pretend,” Goody Grace channels the same feelings of longing for the kind of seemingly forbidden romance that aughts anthems like “Grand Theft Autumn/Where Is Your Boy?” and “Miserable at Best” allowed all of our middle-school hearts to spill over. It’s less Romeo & Juliet and more watching your best friend fall in love with somebody else, the kind of universal heartache that is all too tangible and you can’t help but wallow in.
He’s strapped up with an acoustic guitar, a bed of flowers, and old-fashioned tube TV’s replaying delicate moments of romantic nostalgia as he pours over spilled emotion as he sings “Fuck you and your new boyfriend/I bet he doesn’t know the things that I know and/I bet he doesn’t know your hidden love for punk bands or your infatuation with drunk romance./Can we pretend that you leave him and we can be more than friends?/We can return to how we were when we met/And we’ll pretend.”
When asked about the track, Goody Grace said: “Pretend is an acoustic based song inspired by my folk music influence. It’s my modern day take on the styles of my favorite Bob Dylan or Tom Waits finger picked guitar sound. The lyrics are about wanting to be able to pretend things are how they used to be with a past love.”
Watch the music video for “Pretend” above and add the Infinite EP to your playlist here.
