Love is All
A Hundred Things Keep Me Up at Night
Rating: 4.5
Label: Whats Your Rupture?
Josephine Olausson, the lead vocalist of Love is All, has had some rough times- at least, I would think so from the band of Swedes’ latest A Hundred Things Keep Me Up at Night. Beginning to end, it’s a breakup story told in pop tones, with every color of shrill aggression balanced with beautiful melodies and wry lyrics. To be honest, the first couple of listens, I found myself off put by the chopped guitars and Olausson’s erratic vocal delivery- but soon enough I found myself drifting back again, listening to lines like “As I get up to go / I notice someone I vaguely know / He’s not my type and I’m not his / But I’m sure he’s alright” with a wider smile each time.
Olausson’s charisma has a lot to do with the success of the record- her voice alternates between the kind of girlish mew that Joanna Newsom has already mined so deeply and a shouted, sibilant chant. The combination (often in the same song) is effective enough to buoy both the loud, muscular songs like opener “New Beginnings” and the more pop-oriented numbers. The former begins with a tinny guitar, only to be followed by the thunder of a frantic, Andy McKay-esque saxophone, while Olausson and guitarist Nicholaus Sparding trade vocals and the whole thing descends into a shouted, pounding shamble- it’s brilliant.
The instrumentation of the album is also a point in its favor- aside the aforementioned tin guitars and saxophones, A Hundred Things makes good use of bells and the melodica. The whole production is swathed in a gauzy, vague and yet tremendously present sound; it’s reminiscent of the quieter moments of Psychocandy, but doesn’t suffer for the comparison. While the brothers Reid may have moaned about Cindy and knives in their head, they never really sounded like it hurt all that much; Love is All sound in real pain.
“Give It Back” and “Last Choice” are two of the choicest cuts; the first is an exhilarating, horn driven ride through the wreckage of a dead relationship, Sparding’s guitar whipping in and out of the melody constantly. “Last Choice” is the tale of a doomed-from-the-start one night stand, driven by boredom, loneliness, and well, there not being anyone else around to go home with; it’s not difficult to empathize with the situation, and when it’s couched in chiming keyboards and an effortless melody, it’s irresistible.
For all of those charms, “A More Uncertain Future” is the crowning glory and emotional heart of the A Hundred Things. A haunting melodica over an echoed drumbeat, followed by “I’m better without your doubt / For now“; it’s heartbreaking in the way that makes you want to listen again and again. When Olausson and Sparding desperately back and forth “Maybe if I promised you / Promises are not for“, a little bit of you dies while you smile. If the album has a fault, it’s that some of the weaker songs can’t quite match up to the best. If that’s Love is All’s biggest problem, then good luck to them on their next album.
by Nathan Kamal
