Lights
Rites
Rating: 2.0/5.0
Label: Drag City
Lights is the kind of band that’s a little difficult to categorize; their new album Rites is by turns psychedelic, bass-heavy dance, sometimes even experimental. Unfortunately, being hard to place doesn’t always translate to superior quality. Sometimes this scattering of ideas and the technical skill to solidify them creates a great album, while other times it produces a merely listenable one.
Rites’s dominant sound (if any) is reverbed-out guitars, echoing like great sheets of metal pressed into music. Sophia Knapp has a distinct sound, rhythmic and delicate at once; she and the other two members of Lights, bassist Andy Macleod and drummer Linnea Vedder, all share vocals in loose harmonies and overlaps. They even enlist two other vocalists for their catchiest song, the inanely danceable “Fire Night.” They also share cover art with the interestingly named artist Wizard Smoke. Posed all in white, there’s something deeply retro about the band, like they should be surrounded by dry ice or disco balls.
Opening track “Heavy Drops” aptly shows off Lights’ ability to put together a pop song, with lovely choruses and a chugging guitar. Yet it also reveals their biggest flaw: an inability to leave well enough alone. Throughout the album there are unnecessary changes to the structure and/or tempo of the song, which is both jarring and throws a listener off the pace. If it’s meant to be challenging, I suppose it is, but nothing else would prompt me to believe that. “Can You Hear Me” and the aforementioned “Fire Night” both have indelibly memorable bass lines, but their throwaway lyrics blot most of that out, particularly as the vocals are mixed far to the front. “Dance together/ Around the fire/ Moon gets lower/ Sun gets higher:” simplicity and directness have their place, I suppose. Certainly that’s better than the nearly spoken-word dramatics of “Hold On” or the near-instrumental keenings of “War Theme.”
But I hate to be negative. The band certainly knows what they’re doing; they just seem to have trouble focusing. The Julee Cruise-esque “Nothing Left To Build” is beautifully touching, a lilting bass wrapping itself around keyboards courtesy of Patrick Cleandenim. The final track, a cover of Fleetwood Mac’s “Save Me A Place,” is undoubtedly the standout, with Macleod’s husky voice carrying the song. Lights have a lot going for them, if they’d let it.
by Nathan Kamal
