The arrival of Jenny Lewis' fourth solo album, On The Line, is imminent.

And if "Wasted Youth" is any indication, the new record promises to be a wrenching and gorgeous trip. The third single released from On The Line bounces with a deceptively easy-going twang while meditating on addiction and lost time. It's a sound that lives somewhere between Dolly Parton and Carole King, sowing a saccharine sadness under its nostalgic pulse, but Lewis still effortlessly stakes her ground.

Beginning with a jaunty piano trill, the song's foreground is Lewis' voice lilting around a beautifully-echoing guitar lick, giving depth and vigor to the act of memory. But her lyrics are resigned and somewhat barbed in their look back: "Why you lyin'? / The bourbon's gone," she sings exasperatedly at one point; "Mercury hasn't been in retrograde for that long." The song rings with the sound of regret, but "Wasted Youth" makes a point of not wallowing in the pain of what's past. Instead, Lewis seems more interested in remembering as an act of survival, taking the days lazed away with drink and drugs "just because," as just more stories she alone gets to tell.

There's a lot to be said for a nostalgic artist playing with a walk down memory lane like this, recasting youth as something lost while not letting that loss consume her. Jenny Lewis makes "Wasted Youth" as an affecting experiment in memory while surrounding it safely in a wistful melody. The remorse of hindsight rarely sounds this self-aware, but Lewis has whole-heartedly nailed it.

Jenny Lewis - Wasted Youth (Audio Video)youtu.be

Matthew Apadula is a writer and music critic from New York. His work has previously appeared on GIGsoup Music and in Drunk in a Midnight Choir.

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