Green Seagull

The psych-pop pendulum can sway in several directions; swerving from faithful extensions of the past to an approach that folds baroque ripples into modern forms. In order to pull off the former, a band needs to be committed and, thankfully for Green Segall, they’re all in. The new record continues their tenure of inhabiting the ’60s with full faithfulness, continuing to slip down the decadent rainbow as if the winds never changed from ’69 onward. Like peers who mine the era — The Mellons, Triptides, Magic Fig, Vanity Mirror — Green Seagull leans towards kaleidoscopic aesthetics, but also inhabits the character of writing technicolor gems from the perspective that the boot never came down on the love-in, that cocaine, cynicism, and the CIA never shut the party down.

Yet, unlike their peers in The Mellons or even Vanity Mirror, they don’t swing so close to the sun. They embrace a baroque-banded melancholy that wraps organ swells, rose-tinted harmonies, and catchy strums with a bittersweet heart. They hew closer to the buttoned up and blue atmospheres of The Left Banke and The Zombies, squeezing a touch of sadness through the prismed patterns and paisley pining. As with any band that embraces the genre, there’s a certain amount of pastiche as entry fee, but laying back and leaning into the liquid light lysergia opens Smoke and Mirrors up as a deep, fragrant listen.

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