Mortal Primetime＜Colored Vinyl＞

Sunflower Bean embrace adulthood and rock riffs on their candid fourth album, 2025s Mortal Primetime. Friends since they were teens, bandmates singer/bassist Julia Cumming, guitarist/singer Nick Kivlen, and drummer Olive Faber grew up together while making music. They brought that familial relationship to their hooky indie pop albums and garnered a new level of pop sophistication on 2022s Headful of Sugar. However, that pinnacle was followed by a season of change for the Brooklyn-based trio, with Kivlen relocating to Los Angeles and Faber launching her own band, Stars Revenge. As they drifted apart, Cumming went through a romantic breakup and initially found herself writing through the pain alone. Rather than end the band, Sunflower Bean reconvened to work on the material, a process that finds them having matured into a sleeker, tougher version of themselves. Its that toughness that first grabs you with the opening "Champagne Taste," a riff-heavy anthem that evokes the snarling 70s rock of the Runaways. It also underscores the raw intensity of emotions at play on the album as Cumming digs into the complexity of heartbreak, singing, "I been down so long/I dont even know Ive been hit/So push fingers into my eyes/But it doesnt hurt a bit." Theres a witchy, empowered energy at the core of Mortal Primetime, whether Cumming is sinking into the moon of heartbreak on "I Knew Love" or smacking the suns face with righteous sexual anger on the Heart-esque "Nothing Romantic." And while the album is punctuated by fuzz-tone rock bombast, its also full of an AM pop melancholy that speaks to Cummings growing skill as a songwriter. "Look What Youve Done to Me" is the kind of literate, lyrical song Paul Williams excelled at in the 60s and 70s, while "Take Out Your Insides" wraps dark heartbreak in a sweet folk-rock melody. Those songs, as with all of Mortal Primetime, leave you with the feeling of a band working through their growing pains and getting honest about their feelings. If you fell in love with Sunflower Beans early indie pop and marveled at their turn towards alt-rock cool, Mortal Primetime is the best of both worlds: an assured album of rock & roll magic dusted with emotive pop pathos. ~ Matt Collar

ハード・ロッキンなギター・リフを閃かせ、1曲目から驚かせる4枚目のアルバム。90sオルタナを立脚点に60年代リヴァイヴァルを実践していたNYの3人組は今回、70年代を意識したのだそう。その試みはトラッド・フォーキーなアプローチにも及ぶ。ストリングスのみならず、華麗なハーモニー・ワークも交えつつ、最後を飾るバラード"Sunshine"はギターの轟音で締め括り。
bounce (C)山口智男