Beach House
Devotion (Carpark)
ESSENTIAL "Astronaut"
There's a funny note in the promotional materials for "Devotion," the sophomore release from the dreamy Baltimore duo Beach House. "On 'Devotion,' listeners will also hear the band's longtime admiration for '60s Motown and country folk."
Most listeners would laugh at that because "Devotion" is by all means a dark and narcotic album, hazy and mercurial, not exactly the stuff that would have given the Supremes a Top 10 hit. Still, the album is a notable departure from Beach House's 2006 self-titled debut - and it's endlessly more engrossing and cinematic.
The tried-and-true formula remains intact: Victoria Legrand plays the organ and sings awash in layers of reverb that make her sound submerged underwater; Alex Scally echoes her sentiments on lonesome slide guitar.
But they've also opened up the songs with classic-pop flourishes - tambourines on "Home Again," chimes on "D.A.R.L.I.N.G.," and girl-group harmonies on "You Came to Me." At the end of "Astronaut," the song shifts from a celestial interplay between Legrand's falsetto and Scally's slide guitar, and suddenly Legrand is cooing, "Hey, be my baby/ Don't be maybe." Meanwhile, "Gila" hinges on an infectious chorus based on the word "oh" repeated 16 times, with a key change on the 9th one.
The song buries deep in the psyche, like most of this album does. That's the magic of Beach House's music: It's transfixing in the moment and even more so once you've stopped listening. [James Reed]
Beach House plays at the Middle East Upstairs Monday.
