Album Review: DWNTWN Show Life Is About “Racing Time”
DWNTWN have a sonic goal: to capture time. Will they do it? Stay tune. Yeah, if DWNTWN Racing Time album was a television show it would probably, go as such. Through music and lyrics they are trying to embody and elaborate the most complex construct, I think, human being have ever created: time.
Time is a weird frenemy. He gives us comfort in being able to clock and crutch to hours, minutes, and seconds as if they are definers of our existence. Wes say, “I can do this if it at 3pm”, or “I cannot do that if it takes a year”. We measure everything in our life according to time because, subconsciously, we know everything is temporary. Hence, DWNTWN’s Racing Time plays with pacing as the most important aspect of the album. Every electro beat that holds on, every hook that lingers, every chord that speeds up, and every vocal that lead songstress Jamie Leffler elongates from a note into a whisper comes with a purpose: to reveal time as a prisoner of and prison guard to our hearts. “Drowning”, “Fourteen”, “Lonely”, and “Back & Forth” feel as if they were each written after a plan did not go accordingly and Leffler’s emotions rushed forward. It amazing to see we keep ourselves sentimentally composed until a plan gets finished or dashed, but we never emotionally process them. Leffler’s voice is our permission to proces how time flies by having a breathy wistfulness. It is as if her vocal chords are aerial; they simply swing and fly forward with the grace and peace of a dove. She is so unfazed in songs such as, “Little Night Song” and “Love Someone”, which again furthers this as an album to lightly process the floating of time.
Although DWNTWN has been defined as electro-pop, there is a subtle country feel to them. Every-time I hear an acoustic roll that confronts the feelings of mundane in our day to day, I think of country or folk music. Of course, there is more synths and sweets to their instrumentals, but, in essence, Racing Time is an album to sit, listen, and dreamily drift in place. For More Information On DWNTWN and To Buy Racing Time On July 21 Click Here.
