(Domino, out Fri 13 Jul 2018)
After their 2017 LP, one that everyone titled “the breakup album” (and which Dirty Projectors themselves creatively titled Dirty Projectors), we see the Brooklyn band here anew, upbeat, heart-mended and at their best with Lamp Lit Prose.
It’s got beauty and oddness in buckets, this time with an evident joy marbled through the whole record. The first single release Break-Thru bops and chugs along in spritely fashion, with a catchy African guitar riff. It’s a great first single that really sets the measure of the album.
From start to finish Lamp Lit Prose feels like a concept album of boy-meets-girl. More specifically, in this case it’s girl-meets-broken-boy-then-boy-falls-in-love-with-girl-and-writes-a-whopper-of-an-album. As the tracks progress from puppy love to life-affirming enamoration, the highlight comes in the form of You’re The One: “I’ll always have love for what came before and with you I feel it more and more.” Void of the trademark manic guitars, peculiar arrangements and solid beats that fans know and enjoy, this concluding love letter has singer David Longstreth at his most graceful; free flowing and profound. It’s a joy to listen to.
Musically, Lamp Lit Prose is like you would expect from the indie pop band: multi-layered and inventive with mindful production, the sort that allows you to taste each layer of the musical lasagna with your musical tongue (that’s your ear, in case you were lost completely in the layered lasagna metaphor).
After Amber Coffman’s departure from both the band and her personal relationship with Longstreth, we saw an ambling effort on the 2017 self-titled album. They say the breakup album is always the best – the Back To Blacks and the Rumours of this world. Through misery and hardship art is seen at its most beautiful and profound. Here we can see that darkness, be it potent or not, is no match for the light. Certainly, when it comes to one indie pop band from Brooklyn.