Strange Souvenirs – Beaches (2021)
After being left untouched for almost a year, ‘Beaches’ by Strange Souvenirs has been unleashed. A rather mellow single, it is very different to their last release acting as the calm that follows an intense storm. Using the imagery of the beach and ocean waves, the band brings bittersweet feelings to the push and pull of the past and present stinging listeners with the windy sands of emotion.
Written after a sleepless night, the single is a wonderful counter to the sprawling tones of ‘Nothing2’. While different to their last release, it continues the band’s genre-blending and colourful sound. The brainchild of brothers Matthias and Thomas Juhnke, their music is rich in sonic anomalies that reach through to us from a distance and alien soundscape.
‘Beaches’ has a very mellow opening that warbles with some lo-fi vibes. The shuffling drums add to the mellow vibes making you want to relax on the cool sands of the beach. As the music washes over you, an easy feeling engulfs you and fills your sense with relaxed vibes. The guitars and drums have a light sway to them that enhances the easy vibes of the track. Through all of this, there is a strange late-night feeling that twinkles in the higher levels of the track.
The easiness of the melody is a little at odds with the bittersweet emotions that drop from the vocals. When the vocals enter, they are like a contented sigh against your ears. The lyrics bring the imagery of happy times on the beach but the emotions woven into the vocal performance are rather melancholic. It is like you have been somewhere that should be fun but you aren’t feeling it and everything just passes you while you stand still. This is wonderful when combined with the utterly relaxed music to bring a contrast of feeling and sound. As the single progresses, you feel the yearning to move on from the numbness that has filled the single and find something that will bring light back to your life.
Strange Souvenirs fill you with a relaxed bittersweet feeling as they combine mellow music with melancholic vocals in their single ‘Beaches’. The music has you relaxing into the sands of the soundscape before the vocals fill you with melancholy. Through the performance, they acknowledge the numbness many people feel and the yearning to find something that will alleviate this.
Find out more about Strange Souvenirs on their Facebook, Instagram and Spotify.
