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Record Review: Beach House, Teen Dream

January 27, 2010 by Andy

We’re going to review some records again. Records we think we all should care about whether they’re good or bad. Cool? Cool.

all words: Andy Hess

For the readers: I have an unhealthy obsession with the perfect pop song (read: Since U Been Gone, You Belong To Me — apparently my ears want me to be a teenage girl), understated guitar albums and I could not live without Weezer — well, maybe post-Pinkerton Weezer — or The Hold Steady.

Rating system
0 stars – Complete and utter garbage
1 star – Best just not to ever press play, save your ears for another day
2 stars – Not completely atrocious, but one you’ll probably forget about as soon as it’s over
3 stars – Good, but not great, likely with some excellent songs and others you’ll skip right through
4 stars – Damn good album, one you’ll definitely want to enjoy again and again
5 stars – Instant Classic

5 out of 5 stars | Stream | Buy Teen Dream [Sub Pop; 2010]

My relationship with Beach House has always been touch and go.

They’re a band whose music I enjoy, but we never hit it off. Their self-titled release and 2008’s Devotion had some killer songs — “Apple Orchard” and “Gila” respectively — but it was hard to tell one release from the other. That changed with Teen Dream — the group’s first release with Sub Pop. Sure, the hazy dream pop of records past are there, but the subtle changes — the genre hopping, live drums, the use of cymbals (!) — make this their most immediate record.

Like last year’s Merriweather Post Pavilion (don’t worry this isn’t my album of the year), Beach House manages to create a sound that is accessible without compromising their aesthetics for spins.  Produced by Chris Coady (TV On The Radio, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Blonde Redhead) and recorded in a converted church in New York, Teen Dream centers around Alex Scally’s guitars and Victoria Legrand’s keys and croon.

Even with the pop sensibilities and bright flourishes of sound, Teen Dream reads like lost love letter instead of a jubilant high school nostalgia trip found in M83’s 2008 release, Saturdays = Youth.  In “Walk In The Park”, Legrand tries to forget a past relationship. “In a matter of time, it would slip from my mind / In and out of my life, you would slip from my mind.” But it’s not all love lost for Legrand. Later during “Take Care”, the album’s closer, she finds a grain of hope in finding someone new. “I’d take care of you if you’d ask me to.”

To be blunt: buy this record.

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