Label: Nevado Music
Released: November 6, 2015
In a way, Lovish is almost two albums, an earthier, grounded first side followed by a colder, post-punk side two. Opening with the rough, grittiness of “Oh Donna,” Library Voices set the stage for the simple truths of almost Springsteen caliber. The hard facts of life are spun optimistically as they sing, “All of your heroes they’re all assholes, but that don’t mean you should piss on your dreams.” While “Sunburnt in LA” has a more precise 80s pop vibe, it again deals in the reality of love rather than cheating by focusing only on its glories or its heartbreaks. For the remainder of the album’s first half, Library Voices channel 60s psyche fuzz through more recent conventions like post-punk and power pop.
The two halves hinge on “The Wild Roar of Love,” a ballad that is not wild or roaring, but pleading. From there, the album deals in Church-esque dream pop (“Escape Artist”), Heroes-era Bowie (“Bored in Berlin”) and more generally post-punk angles and even vaguely gothic textures. The soulful sound of “Fangs of Love,” like “Sunburnt in LA,” ties back to the opposite end of the record and perhaps that is what makes this seemingly divergent work cohesive nonetheless. The dark, ethereal “Every Night” devolves into a couple minutes of static that sit at the far end of the spectrum from the bold truths that open Lovish.
When all is said and done, Library Voices have made an album with great interest. It is, perhaps, two sides of one coin as it finds its own way to be both different and yet the same.