Everything Changes, Everything Stays the Same

It only took 40 years, but the Loft finally recorded and released an album. The legendary indie pop pioneers famously issued a handful of highly influential singles in the mid-80s for the Creation label, then as things were starting to look like they were going to really get special, they imploded. The bands main songwriter, Peter Astor, took his talents to the Weather Prophets and a lengthy solo career, but one was always left with a big "what if" when it came to the Lofts legacy. It would be too much to ask that their 2025 reunion album, Everything Changes Everything Stays the Same, would sound as wired and edgy as the groups early run of singles. Songs like "Why Does the Rain" and "Winter" had the raw jangle and emotion of disaffected and bleak English youth, the twin guitars pairing to whip up static walls of electricity that the rhythm section pushed along like a rolling machine, while Astor delivered stripped-down poetry through clenched jaws. Everything Changes Everything Stays the Same changes out youthful angst for grown-up angst as it dials back the guitar noise, couches the vocals in harmonies, and mostly sticks to tracks that amble along gracefully instead of charging ahead willy-nilly. The restraint certainly suits the songs Astor wrote, which as the title might lead one to believe, are prone to looking back in melancholy, with the words and melodies sinking in like a sip of well-aged Scotch. Its an approach that one well-versed in Astors post-Loft work will be well familiar with, and in the end, Everything Changes Everything Stays the Same comes across like a fine Weather Prophets or solo Astor album, made a little more exciting due to the name on the front and Andy Stricklands crackling guitar leads that juice up the proceedings nicely. There might not be a song as classic as "Up the Hill and Down the Slope" to be found here, but thats not to say that lovely ballads like "Greensward Days," bouncy retro-pop tunes like "Dr Clarke," or deeply felt indie rock mini-epics ("This Machine") are any less meaningful, or that the record isnt a worthwhile and enjoyable sequel to the bands early singles. Its been said that one cant go back home again, but as the return of the Loft and this excellent debut album prove, sometimes a trip back to an adjacent neighborhood can be nearly as fulfilling. ~ Tim Sendra