The Sea & Cake
Car Alarm
The only band to have made it onto one of these lists for two years running, The Sea & Cake can't be criticized for not having done as much to change up their sound--while Car Alarm doesn't sound like it was recorded in the same studio as last year's Everybody, there's no mistaking the sound of Sam Prekop's voice, always on the edge of a whisper, always escaping inside the throbbing bass guitar when you turn it up to hear what he's singing--but it's still a direct shot from the heart of one of last years quietest, and most aesthetically gorgeous, pieces of music from a band consumed with how to do so much at such a low tone. The struggle to define Sea & Cake's sound can actually be said to have gotten even harder--losing so much of Everybody's keyboard work makes it harder and harder to find the jazz connection that the first three albums of their career are most known for. Here, on their eigthh studio album, Prekop and crew have taken what they first began last year and toned it even farther down, bringing out an album that's a quiet, almost ethereal study in pop. With the exception of the closing track "Mirrors," the sort of garage house sound experiment probably only familiar to people who listen to musique concrete, each song is brief (all twelve tracks add up to around roughly 38 minutes) experiment in seeing how much languid pleasure can be wrangled out of Prekop's distinct vocals, his baldly simple lyrics, and a bunch of guitars played with a delicate touch. It's always going to be tempting to read too much into music from Sea & Cake--the bands prolific work outside of their music work paints them as being far too intelligent to not be doing more--but that's also going to be a disservice to work that is so blatantly designed to be enjoyed. While a lot of musicians build their careers out of creating music to serve as life's soundtrack, these men are choosing instead, to try and capture beauty--then they just ask if you wouldn't prefer that instead.
-Tucker Stone, 2008
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