Talulahs Tape

Good Flying Birds debut album Talulahs Tape is the work of youngsters deeply in love with the sounds of indie pop. Their devoted infatuation dates back to C-86 and gathers up every twist and turn in the story as they bop along to the present day. They add elements of jangle pop, shoegaze, lo-fi, dream pop, indie rock, and noise pop, gleefully taking bits and bobs from each and welding them into a glorious creation of their very own. It helps that they only borrow and steal from the best aspects of each style, injecting plenty of joyous energy into the arrangements and performances while making every melody as sweet as ice cold lemonade on a sweltering summer day. The production is perfect as well, coming across happily mid-fi and home cooked. The guitars have all kinds of bite on the more aggressive songs and are lullaby soft on the quiet ones, while the rhythm section is rock solid and never detracts; it just adds support and excitement along the way. Add the tender, dewy vocals of Kellen Baker and Suzie Slaughter to the mix and the result is something special. Its no nostalgia trip, even though its basted in the juices of the past. Its not a pastiche or a pale imitation either; its a brilliant re-creation, adaptation, and upgrade that mixes and mashes with abandon and skill. The more straight-ahead pop songs like "Glass" have the beating heart-on-sleeve sincerity and rippling, jaggedly jangling guitars of the best indie pop, musically loose and intense at once while shooting bolts of heartbreak into the listeners ear. The heavier tracks, like the rollicking shoegaze noise blast "Erics Eyes," threaten to leap off the records surface, spinning up clouds of dust like the Tasmanian Devil as they breathlessly race to the finish. Between the hooky pop songs and fuzzy rockers are songs that have the densely packed feel of something on Elephant 6 ("Dynamic"), a nicely wobbly Kindercore-esque sound ("I Care for You"), very pretty acoustic backing ("Every Day Is Another"), and a falling-apart-at-the-seams approach that mirrors that of one of their main inspirations -- Talulah Gosh -- but then tempers it with the squirrelly agit pop of the Feelies ("Pulling Hair"). It may seem like one needs some kind of decoder ring to get all the influences and references that pop up over the course of the album, but thats not the case. Talulahs Tape is a superb version of indie pop that stands on its own thanks to the perfect blend of lo-fi sound and extremely committed playing, not to mention the incredibly strong songs. One trick to updating the past is to make sure you dont just have all the right pedals and amp settings -- there have to be real deal songs that make people feel something. Good Flying Birds have the sound, and they have the songs, and Talulahs Tape is perfect indie pop circa 2025. ~ Tim Sendra