It’s with a slight embarrassment that I confess that before sitting down to write this review for their new album C’mon, I had not heard a single album from American indie rock trio Low. So, although I may be unfamiliar with their history, this also means that I am not burdened with a heap of expectations. According to their press release, the album is the quieter and introspective cousin to their last album Drums and Guns. And so while that 2007 release was the sound of a resigned band caught in the middle of social unrest, C’mon is the calm after the storm, if you will.
First track “Try To Sleep” seems to fit this bill perfectly, with warm and full guitars, a gentle xylophone melody, and lyrics about the desire to relax and find an inner-peace despite exterior events that threaten this. It is an enchanting lullaby, but also sounds confused and almost sinister, reflecting much of the rest of the album. Elsewhere on highlight “Especially Me”, drummer Mimi Parker takes lead vocals and rides a bobbing guitar loop for the first four minutes, after which she meets haunting strings that carry out the song.
The drums, the vocals, the guitars, everything sounds great on this album. This is probably the result of recording at Sacred Heart Studio – a former cathedral – in Minnesota. Low and co-producer Matt Beckley used the natural reverb to open up their sound to startling effect. The guitars have an airy, warm and lush presence, and properly soar when they need to – especially during solos in “Witches” and the swaying “Nothing But Heart”.
While I wouldn’t say that this isn’t an overtly political album that deals with specifically modern themes, it is one that sounds like a hushed plea for calmness and rationality in a confused world. It doesn’t focus so much on energy on trying to come to terms with exterior political events per se, but rather how one can learn to cope with the feelings these events produce. There is evil dwelling everywhere in this album, but Low seem bent on establishing an emotionally healthy state of mind – it is deeply comforting in this sense. C’mon probably wont win the band any new admirers, nor will it be any hardcore fans favourite album. However, I don’t think this is what Low were aiming for: this is a quiet and unassuming album from a group that has little left to prove.
Wyatt Lawton-Masi
