Album Review: HAIM’s, I Quit, Finds Power In Letting Go

Jun 24, 2025 admin_bitlc Features, Music News, Reviews 0

By Eduardo Gomez

There’s a rare kind of clarity that comes when you finally realize you don’t owe your love, or your identity, to anyone else. HAIM’s newest album I quit captures that moment of self-realization with their opener, “Gone.” The track sets the tone as both an anthem and an unapologetic awakening in sampling George Micheal’s “Freedom.” There’s a visceral power in the way the track shares the idea to cut the emotional restraints that love can quietly wrap around us. The song faces a hard-earned truth: you are not defined by someone else’s expectations. You are where you are because you fought to be. The mirror becomes your biggest hype man, reminding you that the respect you give yourself is non-negotiable and entirely in control. That confidence, that unapologetic ownership of who you are, courses through the track like adrenaline in the form of melodic confessions.

“All over me” plays like a classic love song on the surface. Beneath the smooth production lies a quiet conflict. She’s not just serenading a lover, she’s confronting the weight of monogamy. It’s a tender track where commitment feels less like comfort and more like a question mark. Singing directly to a temporary lover tangled in the sheets, she battles with the idea of permanence in a wild world where fleeing connections sometimes feel more honest than lifelong promises.

When we put a label on a relationship, everything shifts. That universal desire for love starts to feel heavy when the realities tied to it begin to erode the connection itself. “Relationships” humorously touches on this cycle of relationships that eventually break, so what’s the point? There’s real hardship in consciously committing to someone else, and in this dreamy track, we don’t point fingers. Instead, we hold up a mirror, blaming no one but themselves for falling into the same pattern again. It’s cheeky, self-aware, and painfully relatable.

The next track, “Down to be wrong” pulls you straight into that dangerous, familiar headspace. Where you’re living with a decision made by a better version of yourself. A version that was grounded, clear, and emotionally healthier. But now, in your current state, it’s harder to see the logic. So you start compiling a list of reasons to hate the love you left. And maybe even the person you’ve become since. There’s bitterness, self-doubt, and an aching back and forth between past clarity and present chaos. Still, the song reminds us of the power in honoring decisions made from a place of strength, even if your current mindset was to undo them. As the track closes, Danielle repeats, “Down to be Wrong / Don’t need to be right,” while we hear “Red lights are up ahead but I keep walking” in the background. It’s a moment of surrender. Choosing growth over pride. It’s about accepting the contradiction of still caring, still wondering, but choosing to move forward with everything unresolved. It sits in that messy, dangerous space between knowing better and doing it anyway.

“Take me back” is a compilation of moments you’d give anything to relive. It’s a recollection of memories from a time when the present didn’t feel like something to escape. When everything you ever wanted existed in the now. We hear, “All of my friends I loved, I still love / And all of my lovers are locked in time,” and there’s something that stood out in how relatable this feeling is. Love becomes a matter of time. Some people stay, some people fade, but the moments remain suspended. What stands out most is how the song celebrates the constancy of friendship. Through breakups, bad decisions, and blurry nights, it’s your friends who stay. They’ve witnessed the worst, the collapse, and the rebuilding. That shared history is what makes the bond so beautiful. Lovers come and go, but real friends are much harder to lose in time. Living in a cloud of nostalgia, the song reaches for a version of life led by small joys and simple problems. The repetition hugs listeners with this universal ache for something once familiar. Even in sharing personal memories, HAIM wants us to map our own pasts onto the song. And in that connection, she brings us with her to the next track.

Through a glimpse of vulnerability, pride takes a backseat and the question slips out, “It’s hard to love you right?” It’s a quiet admission that feels like it’s been sitting at the tip of her tongue for too long. The track, “Love you right” feels like a shield. It’s guarded, as if it’s trying to protect a love that’s grown too consuming. She’s holding up a structure that feels fragile and one-sided, like the smallest distraction could send everything crashing down. And yet, in describing the intensity, she still peeks her head out just long enough to ask the question again. It’s about acknowledging how difficult it can be to love someone when the emotional foundation is always shifting. That honesty turns into a full confession as we conclude the track, “So I guess I’ll never find the strength to love you right.” It’s a heartbreaking surrender to a lack of accountability from her love.

In a stripped-back track that feels tender and adrift, “The farm” searches for grounding in the quiet comfort of family. It’s a song that knows what it means to feel lost. Where we are gently reminded that even through the distance, there’s still something steady to hold onto. The farm becomes more than a place. It becomes a symbol of the people who remind us who we are, who offer love when we can’t find it in ourselves. We’re not perfect, but having something, or someone, that keeps you just okay when the world feels overwhelming is home.

“Lucky stars.” Was it luck, fate or just a coincidence that brought that person back in her life? The lyrics ask that very question, with our singer wondering whether the universe finally decided it was her time to feel again, or if this moment is just another accident. Lyrically, it’s one of the stronger tracks. It’s vulnerable, poetic, and relatable. She’s being saved by love, or at least the idea of it. But despite the strength of the writing, the song feels like it lost its grip. The production feels mismatched. It feels like its foundation doesn’t fully understand or support the weight of the lyrics. There’s a sense of disconnect between the two elements that left me hoping for more.

By “Million years,” we’ve journeyed through the tunnel of heartbreak, following twists of love, loss, and reflection. At this point in the album, we’re seeing a light at the end of the tunnel, but it’s still distant. The track offers breath, hope. Reminiscing on moments frozen in time, the lyrics are suggesting that love, while once was the source of pain, might also be the path to healing. It’s what broke us, yes. But now, it stands on something to lean on, something to believe in again. “I’m yours eternally under these eternal blue skies / Maybe we made it just in time.”

The past few tracks had me waiting for a moment like “Everybody’s trying to figure me out.” HAIM delivers the moment where everything aligns again. The production levels up and creates an atmosphere that’s not louder, but more connected. The bandmates meet the emotional energy of the lyrics with intention and let the slow pace feel deliberate rather than stagnant. It’s the kind of track that gives weight to your thoughts as you begin to process the pain. “You think you’re gonna die / you’re not gonna die” is her grounding reality check. The healing begins in her acceptance.

The upbeat, groovy energy of “Try to feel my pain” feels like a return home for HAIM. The sound is effortless, and almost instinctive. There’s a natural ease in how the song unravels. We’re pulled into a snappy percussion and a warm guitar line that introduces us to the chorus that seals the deal for me. It’s confident under lyrics that are still searching, looking for meaning and direction in the road to healing. Honestly, I’ve been waiting for this moment since “Take me back.”

“Spinning” is the outlier of the album. It doesn’t quite fit into the tracklist, but it does demand attention through its dance elements. “I’m spinning around, but I don’t wanna forget about it” captures the heart of the song’s tension. It wants to dance in the old memories, but later contradicts itself by expressing a need to forget. It’s confused, tangled, but that’s the beauty of it. The track is uncertain, but our hesitation takes center stage on the dance floor when the track comes on.

“Cry” captures the realization that you’ve finally moved on. We’ve reached the end of the tunnel. “Seven stages of grief / and I don’t know which I’m on” perfectly sums up the emotional disorientation of letting go. The song doesn’t mourn the person, but the absence of missing them. There’s a strange kind of sadness in gaining clarity. Someone who once felt like your entire world is now just a memory, and even that absence is worth grieving. Happy tears, sad tears, it’s all there, like the final scene of a movie that knew it had to end.

“Blood on the street” calls you out without hesitation. It doesn’t care how the message lands. It’s cold, direct, unapologetic. The track carries that numbing energy of “I’m not mad, I’m just done with you,” and it leans all the way into it. There’s no dramatic explosion, no lingering sadness, just a final, quiet detachment. And somehow, that makes it hit even harder. It becomes a message directly to this person. We close the door and never look back. “And now the sun’s up, I’m out and that’s that.”

We’ve reached the point of letting go. Sprinkle in some anger, a touch of detachment, and the sting of regret, and we arrive at the perfect conclusion to this journey through grief. “Now it’s time” grows naturally from “Cry,” evolving into the voice of someone who’s been through it all, and finally sees it for what it was. There’s a new perspective here, one shaped by the pain in 15 tracks, but not ruled by it. No longer stuck inside the tunnel, but looking back. It’s transformation and closure executed in HAIM’s, I quit.

While the album loses some of its momentum around the halfway mark, it finds its footing again toward the end. The sequencing tells a chronological story of heartbreak and growth in healing that provided me with depth in listening. There are plenty of tracks I’ll be returning to for emotional support. The opener, “Gone” for its unapologetic reminder of self-worth. “Relationships,” for its gritty honesty and humorous take on love’s endless cycle. And “Take me back,” a perfect companion for a solo train ride when you want to feel cinematic and slightly devastated in the passage of time. And that bridge that stops us in it? I’ll go back to that bridge to chase a feeling I can’t quite name. I quit is worth checking out. It’s marked as a turning point in their team dynamic, and shares some strong feelings in their story. Sometimes walking away is exactly what makes the story worth telling.

For more on this album and Haim, click here