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When Beach House first appeared in 2006 with their self-titled debut, a collection of nine songs built from Alex Scally’s aching, reverb-drenched guitar lines and Victoria Legrand’s mystic lyrics and ghostly vocals, they were essentially sketching a blueprint that each subsequent release would both follow and expand on. Teen Dream, in 2010, added romance, melancholy, and lusher melodic elements; 2015’s back-to-back Depression Cherry and Thank Your Lucky Stars were more spacious, with pared-down instrumentation leaving plenty of empty air between the notes. Their latest album, 7, is Beach House at their most restless, exploring new musical terrain while remaining rooted in their core sound.
It’s not a sleight to say that the most exciting songs on 7 distantly resemble older Beach House songs. On lead single “Lemon Glow,” the duo pushes the arena-leaning anthemics of Bloom’s “Wishes” into a deep groove, maybe the first straight-up beat in the band’s catalog. The spastic, jittering synths that introduce “Drunk in LA” sound ripped from a Neon Indian song, but Devotion’s eerie sense of sorrow manifests itself in Legrand’s slowly unfurling vocals and abstract, devastating lyrics. Scally’s use of acoustic guitar on “Lose Your Smile” is unprecedented in Beach House’s catalog, but the wail of a slide guitar on the song’s outro recalls the intro of debut single “Apple Orchard.” “L’Inconnue” is partially sung in French, and it’s one of two tracks to boast a mid-song tempo change, but its organ-led, bleak ambience would feel at home on Thank Your Lucky Stars.
Lyrically, 7 mostly sticks to the group’s established topics: the darker parts of the human mind, the desolate undercurrents of romance. On 7, Legrand leans into the lyrical abstractions that have guided her since Depression Cherry; through her words, she pushes Beach House even further in the metaphysical direction toward which it’s been heading. Present as ever, though, is the haunting, enveloping aura that’s defined the band from day one.
