Mt. Misery
Leading off with the velvet swoon of “Hey,” the new album from Mt. Misery finds the band further carving out their indie pop niche. The first album was a treatise on youth, a cry for freedom after an adolescence mired away from the buzz of culture and looking for escape from their port town upbringing. Three years on the band balances jobs and jangles, settling tentatively into their surroundings, grappling with tales of love lost and found amidst their periodic bouts of wanderlust. Among their contemporaries in strum, Mt. Misery have often been draped in a softer strain of melancholy, and the satin strands that send them off from “Hey” only grow deeper as the album wears on.
In the past I’ve likened the band to Real Estate, owing to their capability with harmonies and soft-focus aesthetics. On the first album the comparison held pretty true, but on Love In Mind they grow closer to the classic sounds of Go-Betweens, The Sneetches, and The Chills. The album refines the band’s sound, softly jangling and leaning into the bittersweet heartache that they capture so well. From the first moment to the last strains, the band transports the listener into their dream-smudged landscape, letting us all bask in the overcast light of uncertain youth, overwhelming love, and the ample anxieties of everyday life.
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