The Review - Beach House - Thank Your Lucky Stars
No you’re not suffering déjà vu or seeing double! This is in fact a second Beach House album review in 2015. Two weeks ago Beach House made the surprise announcement another album was on the way, following up their excellent ‘Depression Cherry’ album released less than two months ago.
After taking in an exciting, loud and overall very impressive concert from Deafheaven last night, Beach House is proving to be the perfect relaxed soundtrack to my day.
The nine songs that make up the latest from Beach House ‘Thank Your Lucky Stars’ were recorded during the same time as ‘Depression Cherry’. Victoria Legrand, the female half of Beach House explains why these songs didn’t make it on to ‘Depression Cherry’: the album was more "political" in nature and that they felt the need for these songs to exist on their own, separate from the long-lens telegraphing of the typical album release cycle.
There is no mistaking this newest offering, as a Beach House album but there IS something different here. It feels more experimental and comes with more of an edge (well as much of an edge as a Beach House album can have). When you get to track #4, ‘One Thing’, it opens with a strong guitar riff, complimented with a backbone of a drumbeat. It’s here you really start to feel the differences on this album.
‘Common Girl’ clocks in as the shortest song on the album but with the keyboard sound looping behind the soft vocals it makes for some of the most interesting/best listening on the album.
Contrast that to the longest song here, Elegy to the Void. A slow building song, that rises up with guitar but goes away as quietly as it started. Pitchfork put it eloquently: "Elegy to the Void" creeps in slow, circling on the twilight axis of Victoria Legrand's deep voice and a low string section. Its effect is like a gravitational vacuum, gently pulling you into a world of vast uncertainty with a "black clock looming." Legrand sings like a knowing guide, a North Star: "To your sons and daughters/ Bending at the altar/ Don't you disappear in the mirror again." A familiar drum chugs in, a guitar rips through with heavenly scratches of feedback, and suspended grief becomes pummeling light. With that, "Elegy to the Void" turns from an ode-to-emptiness into a crucial instructive: thank your lucky stars for everything.”
Track List
1."Majorette" 4:00
2."She's So Lovely" 4:22
3."All Your Yeahs" 3:48
4."One Thing" 5:35
5."Common Girl" 3:07
6."The Traveller" 4:03
7."Elegy to the Void" 6:29
8."Rough Song" 5:14
9."Somewhere Tonight"
This is another great album from a band that is now in the business of consistently making great albums (4 for 4 going back to 2010’s Teen Dream). Bands who don’t hold back material, keep pushing to create strong albums, aren’t keeping fans waiting (although 6 weeks between albums is faster than needed but still refreshing) for new music gets me excited.
Beach House, Thank Your Lucky Stars, has me excited.