New Music (8.27.2015)

Beach House
Depression Cherry

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary to anoint one musical act with the title "Consistently Killing It," one must apparently turn to the often Huxley-esque dystopia that is the city of Baltimore for nominees. Beach House has a defined, limited sound, that can easily pigeonhole or utterly destroy a band's reputation, but which they have used to create vast soundscapes of hazy, keyboard-fueled glory.

When the single "Sparks" was first debuted, I was more than a little concerned that my hometown indie-heroes had gone rogue, a loud, reptetitive guitar sample invades an otherwise standard, foggy Beach House performance. It seemed out of place and more like they were trying to force themselves into a more pop-oriented sound. The truth is, no one song on Depression Cherry can be heard without the context of its surroundings. "Sparks" makes perfect sense, and is obviously brilliant, when preceded by "Levitation" and followed by "Space Song."

While much of Depression Cherry is more aggressive and louder than any previous Beach House release, it's not entirely unrecognizable; the previously mentioned "Space Song" could very easily have been a Bloom single. But the the real revelation here is "PPP" (not to be confused with How to Destroy Angels' VERY different "BBB"), which is dominated by Victoria Legrand's sprechstimme and massive amounts of fuzz, which combine for a truly Phil-Spector-esque wall of sound. It's closeness to Bat For Lashes' "Good Love" and Deerhunter's "Vox Humana" (which itself pulls the drum from the Spector-helmed "Be My Baby") is not a detraction as much as it is proof of the duo's versatility and ability to make any songwriting style their own.

So yes, the award for "Consistently Killing It" goes to Beach House. Each album they create is one of extreme beauty marred by sad life experiences. Depression Cherry is as grand, gorgeous, and sweeping as anything they have pulled from the ether, and is, to quote Colin Joyce, "an album-length sigh as eloquent as a manifesto."

New Music (8.06.2015)

HEALTH
Death Magic

It has been a long time--so long already--since HEALTH released a proper album that most people forgot the California noise-rock band even existed. They shouldn't have though, because if nothing else, Death Magic will remind you with a blast so loud your eardrums will defect. But don't worry, this isn't some ambient wall of static; with their third actual album, HEALTH have created the perfect blend of noise and pop.

Like Nine Inch Nails, and even more so My Bloody Valentine, before them, the structure-less landscape of the noise genre was spread out before HEALTH for them to conquer, like Lawrence of Arabia crossing the Sun's Anvil. Asked the eternal question "how does one take a niche, near-unlistenable genre and create fans," the answer (in all three cases) is "add pop."

Before Nine Inch Nails, industrial was a formless mass of dark-sounding samples and unintelligible, offensive lyrics. Trent Reznor created a following simply by asking "what would happen if there was a 4/4 drum machine here instead of, well, nothing?" Similarly, shoegaze was built out of loud, overly-progressive rock that no one could understand, that is until Kevin Shields asked "what if we played love songs like this?" So now HEATLH is asking, "what if Rhianna wanted to permanently damage everyone's hearing?" And the answer is ridiculously awe-inspiring.

Death Magic is a monolithic pillar of the loudest, coolest, craziest beats ever recorded covered by the most inventive soundscapes and fascinating lyrical structure released since the last Tool album (seriously, still waiting on that one). At the same time, HEALTH made good on their promise of Depeche Mode and...Katy Perry inspiration and made all that bombast as easily digestible as anything in the Hot 100 right now.

But even though HEALTH may have found their bubble-gum side, that doesn't keep the tone from still being disturbingly creepy; with song titles like "Flesh World," "Hurt Yourself," and "Drugs Exist," which have lyrics to match, that sense of dread that accompanied their breakouts "Crimewave" and "Die Slow" is still very much present.

With Death Magic, HEALTH look to expand beyond their small-market, big-noise origins, and begin what will almost surely be the sonic apocalypse: the fateful day when we all give in to our basest of musical impulses, create ceaseless noise, express perpetual nihilism, and cause deafness.