(2023) Youth Valley - Lullabies for Adults    


Review:
After releasing a debut EP recorded with producer Alex Bolpasis that landed them on the Shelflife label in the Americas and Make Me Happy Records in the rest of the world, Athens, Greece's Youth Valley re-enlisted Bolpasis for their debut album. Citing inspirations including the Smiths, the Cure, and DIIV at their inception, the group seems to slightly turn down the Smiths influence while dialing up the others on the resulting Lullabies for Adults, a sturdy eight-song set that fortifies the atmospheres of their melancholy fusion of shoegaze and post-punk. A chiming lead guitar line and insistent repeated bass note start things off on opener "Jean Moreas," a tribute to the Greek poet and essayist (born Ioannis A. Papadiamantopoulos). Crashing drums soon enter, and the bassline breaks loose into melodic syncopation before brooding vocalist Joseph Powell joins in alongside additional layers of shimmer with lines like "Tired of using my head/Trying to prove there's a meaning/Feeling the weight of the pen" on a song that might have felt at home on the Cure's Disintegration. The lighter, still driving "Hurricane" makes more room for Powell and a bouncier guitar line, but Youth Valley get closest to Morrissey et al. later, on "End Credits," which, along with phrases like "bottled neon lies," incorporates enough echoing haze and midtempo restraint to stand as a creation all their own. On the other extreme, the seven-minute, more-harmonic-than-melodic "Pegasus" envelopes itself in bona fide noise by the end, when a returning chorus of "Dive into this world of never-ending dreams" is barely discernable. Along the way, "I Don't Want to Go Out with You, Veronica," a collaboration with composer/electronic musician Serafim Tsotsonis, finds a bittersweet spot between noise and melodic jangle on a debut that, influences aside, impresses with its diligence and majesty. — allmusic



Track List:
01. Jean Moreas
02. Hurricane
03. I Don't Want to Go Out With You, Veronica (feat. Serafim Tsotsonis)
04. Godheads
05. February
06. End Credits
07. Promising Young Man
08. Pegasus
09. Father Forgets


Media Report:
Genre: dream-pop, indie-rock, post-punk
Country: Athens, Greece
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits
Compression mode: Lossless
Writing library: libFLAC 1.2.1 (UTC 2007-09-17)


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