Brooklyn’s maximalist rock band partygirl recently announced an album will be arriving this year. I’m So Charming, I Forgot Who I Was will be the five-piece’s debut, and their first substantial release since the excellent partygirl, which became our top EP in 2022, and still remains one of our favourites today.
Alongside this announcement came the release of “fine, fine, fine”, and we had the pleasure to discuss it with partygirl’s own Pagona Kytzidis. In this first Peeled Back of 2025, Pagona provides an insight into what the single is about, and how its heavy contrast of lyrics and instrumentation came together to form the foundations that I’m So Charming was built on.
You’ve just released your new single, “fine, fine, fine”. What can you tell us about it? Simply put, “fine, fine, fine” is a song about reaching one’s emotional low point, figuring out how to continue to function as normally as possible in society despite that, and the loneliness that the experience manifests. I found that this contradictory and confusing experience was best conveyed through dark, self-confrontational, body horror-inspired lyrics rubbing against the bright, earnest, rhythmic music.
With it being steeped with those personal thoughts and emotions, does the songwriting process become quite cathartic for you? It certainly does! I have spoken a lot about approaching songwriting in partygirl as a means to practice ‘parrhesia,’ a Greek practice of “speaking everything” for the common good, even at personal risk. partygirl’s songs are equal parts truth, aesthetic, and argument and when packaged together, provide a catharsis not just for me and the band as writers, but we hope for the audience experiencing the music, live or recorded.
The relationship between the lyrics and the instrumental. Did that contrast of moods change how you approached the song lyrically? Is it something you’d like to explore further? This contrast was certainly purposeful. I wrote and arranged the chord progressions and lyrics at once. I had been sitting on the main chord progression and the bridge for a long time (I wrote those parts actually 10 years ago, in high school), and wanted to work through the feelings I was experiencing that make up the narratives of the song. I knew I wanted a big first line with a driving, euphoric melody and it all sort of linked at once, including the contradiction. I definitely want to explore this further, and I think we have a lot on this album – which connects to what I said for the prior question, about the songs being equal parts truth, aesthetic, and argument – this applies to both the music and its composite parts as well as the lyrics.
It’s the first single to come from your upcoming album, I’m So Charming, I Forgot Who I Was. What can you tell us about the record? Mainly – we’re so excited for this to finally come out. The whole record has been in action for two years, although you know, like I said, I had written many of these songs or parts of them as much as 10 years ago. It’s really surreal for something we’ve been working for for so long to finally be real that we can share with people and there’s a bit of anxiety and protection with that naturally. Ultimately this is because it feels so precious because I’m so charming, I forgot who I was is a coming-of-age story – it is my coming-of-age story, specifically, it’s for young people who inherited a world that doesn’t make sense, and it hurts you, and it changes you, then you change and you have to figure out who you really are in the middle of all of that. With this thematic center, we – partygirl – experiment with genre and play with the limits of rock music (really, what is rock music in the 21st century? But that’s a whole other discussion…) while connecting it to each song’s individual story. We’re just so excited about this project and hope it can connect with people and it can honor the traditions we’re speaking to in the process.
Is “fine, fine, fine” an introduction to what we could expect to hear throughout the new album? Definitely. It is one of the “pop-ier” songs on the record, but in lots of ways, the contradictions held within the song speak to the themes of the album. The album is for the most part chronological as it relates to the coming-of-age story and fine, fine, fine is the last song on the first half of the record, smack dab in the middle so to speak, it is that turning point moment of numbness, of knowing something has to change because you’ve hit the lowest point of numbness, which comes in waves with delusion, self-improvement, both broken & kept promises, but something’s gotta give. Everything before fine, fine, fine built up the contradiction that leaves to the transformation of Self which necessarily comes after, and in that way it represents a key part of the album’s trajectory.
For those unfamiliar with yourselves. Who/What are your influences? Our influences as a band are always vast and shift as we develop a song, but to jumpstart writing the “fine, fine, fine” way back in 2022, I was listening to records like Mitski’s Be the Cowboy, Fiona Apple’s The Idler Wheel, Big Thief’s Masterpiece and Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe You, The Frames’s Dance the Devil and Fitzcarraldo, Karen Dalton’s In My Own Time, and Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy.
We actually crossed paths back in 2022, with your debut, self-titled EP. Have your thoughts on the EP changed over time? Yeah, it has. The EP was a great starting point, with great songs. But it does, in our view, sort of serve like a demo tape of who we have become today and in that way it’s beautiful. The band has changed so much since then – in ideas, people, practices, vision and plans – that revisiting the EP feels nostalgic. When live, we’ve rearranged those songs to play within the context of who we are now, and that feels very special.
Who’ve you been listening to lately? I’m always so behind on music because I get equally fixated on one thing or just can’t listen to anything at all… but recently I’ve been in a routine of listening to records which are new to me and through this I have become obsessed with Doechii’s Alligator Bites Never Heal (2024), Bjork’s Post (1995), Madison Cunningham’s Revealer (2022), and Alice Coltrane’s Eternity (1976).
and finally, what’s your favourite fruit? Cherries. Sweet and an amazing color and perfect in every single way.
“fine, fine, fine” feels an evolved version of what we heard on partygirl. It still holds the vulnerability in its lyrics but instrumentally highlights the band’s progression, as it’s rich with sound. Strings sweep across the layers with heartache, with guitars providing melodies that boost or enhance them, all atop a rhythm section that maintains their rock roots. It is wonderful, and capped off by Pagona’s vocals that are so distinct and firmly lead the way.
partygirl are one of those bands that can stop you in your tracks. Their music is steeped in tragedy, but always comes from a place of optimism that makes you root for them. It takes sadness and flips it so that the end is always in sight. We’re so excited for I’m So Charming, I Forgot Who I Was, as from everything heard so far, it has the potential to be one of the best albums of the year.