At the moment, Courtney Barnett is in the swing of promoting her upcoming album, Things Take Time, Take Time, which drops on November 12. Today, though, she’s taking a bit of a break from that with a different musical project: An animated TV series adaptation of the classic 1964 children’s novel Harriet The Spy is coming to Apple TV+ on November 19, and Barnett wrote and performed the theme song for it. A trailer for the series was shared today, and so too was Barnett’s full theme song, titled “Smile Real Nice.”
The track runs for a hair over two minutes, and it’s a fun, rhythmic, and breezy rocker much in the vein of Barnett’s other material. The hook is especially catchy and is complemented by equally enrapturing guitar work. All in all, TV theme songs are supposed to be immediately memorable and recognizable, and Barnett’s song definitively checks both of those boxes, all while staying true to her signature style.
Meanwhile, her latest release from Things Take Time, Take Time, “Write A List Of Things To Look Forward To,” dropped a couple weeks ago. Not long after that, she gave fans the opportunity to make their own mixes of that and other songs with a stem mixer on her website.
Listen to “Smile Real Nice” and watch the Harriet The Spy trailer above.