 | Beach House |
Ok, look. I realize albums jam packed with very chilled out, slow paced, dreamy space music are not exactly everyone’s cup of tea. However, when it’s done well, it can be excellent, and that is exactly what Beach House has accomplished with Devotion – a dreamy album which is not only done just about as well as anything in this genre, but is one of the year’s better albums. Dreamy doesn’t even begin to describe this record, however; haunting, drifting, and unbearably delicate, everything on this album works, and works very well. The heartbreaking vocal quality is expertly paired with the music to accomplish exactly what you would want from this record upon hearing the reassuring swishing on the album’s opening bars on Wedding Bell. Follow the jump for the full review.
Listening to this album does evoke images of a beach house, but not the sunny, play-in-the-sand type. It evokes a rainy day winter beach, or that beach house from the snowy beach in Montauk in the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It’s dark yet caring and definitely is not something designed to get the kids onto the dance floor. It’s a heartwrenchingly deliberate (and sometimes creepy) expression of, love, relationships, and well, devotion. Beginning with Wedding Bell whereby Victoria explains simply, “your wish is my command,” all the way through to the final track where she brings things full circle by declaring a ”constant heart of my devotion.” Interspersed throughout are reaffirmations of love and discussion of relationships, (especially on All The Years) and it’s abundantly clear where they got the title to the album…no real mystery.
As for the music, each song sashayes and dreamily drifts from one to the next without much fuss, and at times the transitions even make you question whether or not the band has gone to a new song or simply a new movement. (See how Holy Dances becomes All the Years). The excellent Wedding Bell becomes the sublime You Came to Me, which then slides to the even better Gila as pleasantly as anything else this year, all the while keeping the listener very interested in the process. The vintage organs and guitar over easy, smoky percussion permeate every song, and paired with plinky pianos and wailing vocals, Devotion does it’s job well.
Devotion is exactly what you would expect to get when an album is listed as “dream pop.” It’s chill, dreamy, lazy, easy, beautiful, creative and a pleasure to listen to. On the next dreary day, pull up a chair to a hot cup of [beverage of choice; I'd suggest irish coffee] on a rainy day, toss in Beach House’s Devotion, and bliss right out.
Beach House has not posted any 2009 dates (Sniffle), but they are confirmed for SXSW in Austin this March. That’s in Texas, bitches.
