Lowly (Denmark) – Seasons (single/track from forthcoming album)
A bit of electronic dream pop for ya, tonight. I don’t often feature bands within two months of their first appearance in these pages but Lowly intrigue me, mainly because I really don’t know how to classify them.
In some ways they come across like a pared-down Polyphonic Spree without the battalion of instruments although the five of them make quite enough noise when they put the afterburners on. They have the same psychy pop feel to them and the same capacity to generate ‘joy’ in the listener.
Even their song titles alone generate a positive response. Those on the new album, which is scheduled for release on 17th February, include the title track, ‘Keep up the good work’, ‘What a Day’ and ‘You are good and I love you’.
The feel good factor is almost overwhelming. It reminds me of the episode of Friends when Phoebe was dating a guy, played by Alec Baldwin, who, like Dr Pangloss in Voltaire’s Candide, could only see the good in everyone and everything. When Phoebe dumped him she told him, memorably, that he was “like Santa Claus…on Prozac …at Disneyland…getting laid”, in one of the most memorable put downs in TV history.
‘Seasons’ is a track from that new album and mixes things up a little. It originates from a poem about the sun dragging the seasons over its shoulders “as if it were a normal day job”, and coincidentally influencing all life surrounding it.
And I thought that was the preserve of a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazonian jungle.
Then it becomes an example of abstract storytelling from a human perspective about time and life drifting by.
It’s a song of two halves. The first part is mesmeric, with a fast beat over a repeating synth/pads/bass melody line and occasional swirling electronic effects, and a vocal that is hummed and spoken as much as sung. ‘Drifting by’ is easily applied to it.
Then just as you’re lighting your second joint it picks up pace, volume and even more instrumentation and it could be the countdown (in reverse – you’ll hear and see what I mean) to the lift-off of Apollo 11 from Cape Canaveral, ‘taking Man to the Moon (and yes, I can remember that – just).
I nice little song that is guaranteed to put you in a good mood. As you do.
Find them on:
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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lowlyband/
