Carl Sandburg Visits Me In A Dream

Veteran folk-rock collective Gomez has always delicately walked the line between easily-digestible delicate folk songs to more bombastic rock numbers. And somehow they’ve always succeeded, without ever seeming the least bit to be pandering to a radio-friendly audience. In that sense, Gomez’s new album A New Tide is more of the same, but to stop there would be a disservice. Ian Ball and company have refined their style a bit more, inching closer and closer to what might be called their signature style.

It is becoming ever more clear that Gomez’s music is music that is made by friends. As the story goes, lead singer Ian Ball and drummer Olly Peacock have been friends since birth; they met their future bassist and guitarist at college, and their keyboardist lived near Olly. So, it shouldn’t take long to pick up on the fact that even though this is a tight and cohesive group, they come together to create music that is loose and comfortable. A New Tide is a combination of unbridled British music innovation and accessibility. The vocals of Ian Ball are always precise and piercing, creating an expansive layering to the lush instrumentation.

“Very Strange” and “Airstream Driving”are pulsing, jingly numbers that show Gomez’s penchant for great riffs and distorted powerpop.  “If I Ask You Nicely” bops with a double bass that accentuates  the electronic keyboard rhythms and the catchy claps and snaps.  The twangy anticipation of “Win Park Slope” is coated richly in layers and layers of strings that is as haunting as it is captivating in its pizzicato deliciousness.  “Mix” sounds as if The Postal Service began using real instruments, straight down to the vocals and the subtle angst.

There’s really nothing to wait for. Get A New Tide. Go!

Listen to “Win Park Slope”
Listen to “Airstream Driver“