For years I’ve been a pretty avid fan of any endeavor Canadian artist Spencer Krug graces. From Wolf Parade, to Swan Lake and Frog Eyes, the renowned Sunset Rubdown is his latest ensemble to come back into focus. After a fifteen year hiatus and a slight switch up of band members, Sunset Rubdown is back with their new album, Always Happy To Explode. Krug’s projects have always displayed a fun range of motions and upbeat theatrics to take in as you attentively indulge, and Sunset Rubdown has never fallen short of this.
The album’s opening track, “Losing Light,” is a good display of what we can expect from the album – minds dipped lightly in a new format, while our hearts are still brought back to those acquired moments Krug feeds us so well in every project he adopts. At the risk of being too specific, at 2:30 into the song, you’re placed into that signature vortex as fragments from the past blend so aesthetically well with the new.
Travel a couple of songs down the album and we come to “Candles,” an upbeat track I valued for the bit of recollection and resemblance as it brought me back to some of the band’s former tracks and albums. As the lyrics quote, “Call me if you need me, I’m still here / I am in the last place you went looking for me. “ The album release comes alongside a music video for track “Reappearing Rat,” and I went a bit off the deep end in my interpretation of relaying it to my status of writing in the moment.
Being so familiar with Krug’s work, I wanted to begin writing this before I had even completed the album, and all too often I want to assume and know what all the best things to expect in life are, as I’m gently reground and humbled in reminding myself that I’ve yet to see it all yet. The new album has elaborately carried over thin wisps and traces of nostalgia to bring a smirk of familiarity to anyone’s face, while strongly keeping the haul of formation just out of touch and reach from anything they’ve presented us before.
The album offers songs all containing their individual aspects of phenomena. I admire how the last two tracks are produced to end out the album. It truly does feel like an outro – seeing you out and carefully retouching on those moments of significant prominence from every song. Penultimate track, “The Worm,” really revives the signature sound that distinguishes Sunset Rubdown from all other projects in Krug’s agenda. Followed by a delicately, soft-tuned piano sonnet, “Fable Killer.” A truly perfect, serenading ending to the masterpiece.
Leave a Reply