ALBUM
Beach House, "Depression Cherry" (Sub Pop)
Beach House's music can build ever so slowly to majestic heights, and sometimes it sounds like a merry-go-round built for toddlers, spinning in lazy circles. The Baltimore duo of Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally hasn't varied the template much over the past decade. Legrand's voice is often treated as just another instrument amid the layers of keyboards, guitar and percussion, which is frustrating. When she's given a little more room, she can be enchanting. She emerges through the fog in "Space Song" to deliver one of the album's stronger melodies. "Days of Candy" also delivers a dash of breathtaking serenity, but it eventually recedes. Many of the songs address the notion of transition and change, and this album sounds like the work of a band working through its own transition, unsure of its next move.
greg kot, Chicago Tribune
STREAMING video
The clip for Glen Hansard's "Lowly Deserter," a spirited Irish folk song with horns, shows Irish schoolchildren learning their lessons. tinyurl.com/np72m9p
