Tides End is so smooth that some of its nuances may be lost at first, but before it slips away, it takes listeners on a deceptively breezy and surprisingly affecting journey through moments that can't last.
Musically it’s akin to the recent Neon Neon album, but Kilfoyle’s musings on romance and class are all his own.
It’s an interesting mix of the wide-eyed and sparkly and the beachfront and nonchalant that makes for a hugely radio-friendly record that won’t dent your credibility.
While looking for something more immediate than By the Hedge, Kilfoyle seems to have forgotten that Minks' original, diaphanous guitar-driven melodies worked precisely because they were a little indefinable: they explored territory too subtle for a traditional pop song.
A portion of Tides End listens like a dramatic over-correction into the electro-pop realm. However, by album’s end, Kilfoyle and Verbos find the intersection between vocal melancholy and production excess.
The problem with Tides End as a whole is that it all sounds a bit like a blander, toned-down version of every electro-rock album released in the late Noughties
1 | Romans 3:39 | |
2 | Everything's Fine 3:29 | |
3 | Margot 3:37 | |
4 | Playboys Of The Western World 2:57 | |
5 | Weekenders 4:12 | |
6 | Painted Indian 3:43 | |
7 | Hold Me Now 4:19 | |
8 | Doomed And Cool 4:50 | |
9 | Ark Of Life 3:51 | |
10 | Tides End 4:35 |