No surprise that this is a fairly lovely, sunnily plaintive record. Only thing is that it's also on the indistinct side, despite the various interesting little signs of possible new directions (which often register more as loose ends than anything else).
The standouts are the first two singles, "It's A Shame" and "Fireworks", both accompanied by very charming videos (the latter in particular nails it in grafting an 80s high school prom aesthetic on to the 50s-into-60s pop of the song), and moody closer "Nothing Has To Be True"; in between, things tend to be nice but unmemorable, lacking those terrific melodic twists (or, for the most part, hooks in general) that have particularly distinguished their last couple of albums.
(The Big Black & The Blue, The Lion's Roar (and again), Stay Gold)
The standouts are the first two singles, "It's A Shame" and "Fireworks", both accompanied by very charming videos (the latter in particular nails it in grafting an 80s high school prom aesthetic on to the 50s-into-60s pop of the song), and moody closer "Nothing Has To Be True"; in between, things tend to be nice but unmemorable, lacking those terrific melodic twists (or, for the most part, hooks in general) that have particularly distinguished their last couple of albums.
(The Big Black & The Blue, The Lion's Roar (and again), Stay Gold)
