The Lazy Eyes

Written by Siena Robb

There is something disarming about calling an album Cheesy Love Songs. The title feels playful, almost self-aware, as though it is already anticipating the criticism that might come with writing openly about love. For The Lazy Eyes, though, that was part of the appeal.

The title came about almost accidentally, much like the songs themselves. When the band first wrote “Cheesy Love Song”, the phrase was only intended as a placeholder. Eventually, they decided it suited the track too well to change. When it came time to name the album, history repeated itself.

“We just added an ‘s’ to the end,” they explain.

Behind the joke, however, the title serves another purpose. Calling the songs “cheesy” before anyone else can allows the band to approach vulnerability without taking themselves too seriously. It becomes something of a shield; one that gives them permission to be emotionally honest, brave and unguarded while still keeping a sense of humour about it.

That balance between sincerity and playfulness has long been part of The Lazy Eyes’ appeal. From their early releases through to their debut album SongBook, the Sydney band have built a reputation around an instinctive curiosity; weaving psychedelic textures, intricate arrangements and classic songwriting into music that rewards exploration. Cheesy Love Songs carries that same spirit of discovery, but turns the focus towards something more intimate: the songs, the feelings within them and the space they leave for the listener.

Rather than abandoning the musical imagination that has defined their earlier work, Cheesy Love Songs feels like another chapter in it. The experimentation is still there, but it sits alongside a greater emphasis on melody and emotional clarity. The result is an album that feels connected to the world The Lazy Eyes have been creating since their earliest music, while reflecting the growth that has come with years of writing, recording and performing.

Although the record may feel immediate on first listen, The Lazy Eyes see it differently. For them, it is an album that reveals itself gradually, with subtle details becoming more apparent over time.

“It’s cool and interesting that you find the record immediate,” they say. “To us the record takes time to grow and is pretty subtle at first.”

That sense of discovery is something that has always been central to the band's music. Their earlier work invited listeners to spend time inside the songs, finding new textures and details with every listen. Cheesy Love Songs continues that tradition, but there is a new intimacy to the way those details serve the songwriting.

There is also an intentional emotional openness to the album, though perhaps not in the conventional sense. Rather than dictating exactly how the listener should feel, the band wanted the songs to function as something of a blank canvas. Some tracks may sound happier, others sadder, but the intention was to leave enough space for listeners to bring their own experiences to the music.

A major part of achieving that was allowing the songwriting itself to remain at the centre.

“There was definitely a huge emphasis on letting the songwriting shine through the production,” they explain. “It took a while to learn how to actually achieve that though.”

That process of learning is important to understanding Cheesy Love Songs. The record was not created overnight. Many of its songs were written around 2019 and 2020, meaning the artists finally recording and releasing them were not quite the same artists who had first written them.

In the years between those early ideas and the finished album, The Lazy Eyes had already experienced a remarkable amount of musical growth. Their earlier single “Fuzz Jam” and EP’s established their willingness to experiment, while SongBook gave them space to explore those instincts on a larger scale. Now, with Cheesy Love Songs, that experience has become part of the way they approach the simplest and most important question: what does each song actually need?

The answer is often less about adding more and more, and more about finding the right presentation for what is already there.

The songs themselves often sit with things that are difficult to leave behind; relationships, memories, feelings and moments that continue to linger. Yet these themes were not necessarily chosen according to a predetermined concept. The band describes their lyric-writing process as natural and almost stream-of-consciousness, with songs becoming a way of expressing and processing whatever emotions were present at the time.

“Without telling each other, both of us came with a batch of about five love songs each,” they recall. “I guess we were just inspired by that subject the most at the time of writing the album.”

It is perhaps fitting that a band whose earlier music could be so expansive and exploratory would eventually find themselves drawn towards something as universal as love. The psychedelic sensibility remains, but the emotional centre has moved closer to the surface.

That instinctive approach extends to the way The Lazy Eyes construct their songs. Rather than relying on one particular element, a lyric, melody or production idea, a song begins to feel complete when everything about it starts to feel natural.

“I think it’s when something feels natural and unforced.”

Finding that feeling, however, was not always easy. The recording process involved plenty of experimentation and trial and error, particularly when it came to discovering the right presentation for each song. The goal was for the production to embody and mirror what was already present in the music rather than overpower it.

In many ways, this feels like a natural evolution of what The Lazy Eyes have always done. Their earlier records demonstrated an eagerness to explore what a song could become; Cheesy Love Songs shows an equally strong interest in discovering what a song can be when nothing unnecessary stands between it and the listener.

That attention to detail is part of what makes The Lazy Eyes’ music so rewarding on repeat listens. Their songs often reveal new textures and details with time, something the band themselves value in the music that inspires them. It is not necessarily something they consciously set out to engineer, but it has become an important measure of whether a piece of music feels finished.

“We can’t really plan for that,” they explain. “But it’s something we really value in music that inspires us.”

For The Lazy Eyes, the ultimate goal is always to serve the song. If a piece of music continues to offer new perspectives, it creates a reason to return to it. The band compares that experience to getting to know a friend, someone who remains familiar while continuing to reveal new sides of themselves as they grow.

“Then that makes you want to come back and keep getting to know it like a friend,” they say. “You can grow up and it stays there, but you can keep finding new angles in it.”

It is an idea that feels particularly appropriate for Cheesy Love Songs, given how long these songs have lived with the band. After sitting with the material for years, they had to mature into the songs, learning how to record them, perform them and ultimately sing them in a way that felt right. The distance between writing and releasing the album also allowed the meaning of certain lyrics and ideas to shift. The Lazy Eyes tend to avoid overly literal interpretations of their own music, instead approaching their writing in a more metaphorical way. As a result, the same song can take on a different meaning depending on where they are in their lives, and importantly, depending on where the listener is in theirs.

That openness connects Cheesy Love Songs to the band's earlier catalogue, where atmosphere and interpretation have always played an important role. But there is something particularly fitting about applying that philosophy to songs about love. Love itself changes depending on who is experiencing it, when they are experiencing it and what they carry with them into the moment.

If SongBook captured The Lazy Eyes discovering just how far their musical world could stretch, Cheesy Love Songs captures a band becoming increasingly comfortable with letting the songwriting speak for itself. The two records feel less like separate identities than different points along the same path; one shaped by experimentation and discovery, the other by the confidence that comes from having spent years learning what matters most to them as musicians.

If Cheesy Love Songs has taught the band anything, however, it is perhaps less about any single song and more about their ability to keep going.

“I think we learnt resilience,” they say.

Making and releasing the album proved to be the biggest challenge The Lazy Eyes had faced as a band. There were moments when moving forward was difficult, making the fact that they eventually completed and released the record feel all the more significant.

“It’s really a blessing that we were able to not give up and keep moving forward.”

That resilience is another thread connecting the band's past with their present. The Lazy Eyes have always approached music with a sense of curiosity and persistence, whether experimenting with their earliest recordings, building the expansive world of SongBook, or spending years growing into the songs that would eventually become Cheesy Love Songs.

Rather than seeing that process as something they have now completed, The Lazy Eyes seem to view it as an ongoing one. The next records will bring their own challenges. They want to continue growing, experimenting and pushing themselves. But Cheesy Love Songs has given them something valuable to carry forward: the knowledge that even when making music becomes difficult, there is something worth protecting in the decision to keep going.

And perhaps that is the real strength behind the album. Beneath the cheeky title and the sweetness of its subject matter is a record built on the willingness to be sincere, to let the tracks breathe, to allow listeners to find their own meanings, and to keep returning to something until it finally feels right.

The Lazy Eyes have spent years discovering what their music can do. With Cheesy Love Songs, they seem just as interested in discovering what happens when they simply let the songs be themselves.

Cheesy, perhaps. But never without purpose.