If you are not already familiar with The Naked and Famous, your mind is about to be blown. This New Zealand five-piece established their unique sound back in 2010 with the release of their first album, Passive Me, Aggressive You. The Naked and Famous conveys a variety of music with each track they put out there, so they have been hailed as a post-punk revival, neo-rock, synthpop, indie alternative band. I’m sure the list can go on, but the ability for their music to continuously be multi-labeled shows that they are the ones defining their sound, thus molding their own niche in the music world.
“Girls Like You” was an incredible track off the first album, but this year’s “Hearts Like Ours” might top it, or at least be on the same level with their previous musical feat. The new track begins with a softly approaching synthetic beat that carries throughout the entire song and travels hand in hand with the building percussion and rock rhythm. Alisa Xayalith’s vocals fall somewhere in between the competing melodies, complementing each piece of the song as she croons about the “animal inside”. Thom Powers backs her up by singing about leaving the past behind in “silence”, adding the poetic emotion that tends to act as a foundation for each song the band makes. Interestingly, “Hearts Like Ours” is the exact opposite of silence or emotional, but it somehow manages to peacefully ease your mind without bringing you down. So instead, you are left immersed in the music and singing along about the animal inside all of us.
In Rolling Waves comes out on September 17, and if it is on par with “Hearts Like Ours” it is sure to be an incredible album that helps us enter a new season of music, leaving the heavy-pop sounds of summer behind.
Wow, you're right. Mind has been blown into a spiral of a black hole filled with rainbows. This is really something special.