Album Review: Sunflower Bean Show Life At “Twentytwo In Blue”
Sunflower Bean’s Twenytwo In Blue is exactly what being twenty-two feels like. For most, it is the true beginning of your life. You have probably left college, and have had one year of “legal drinking” under your belt. Yet, more importantly, you have no idea how things are going to turn out, but you have come to the conclusion it does not turn out like you want.
Twenty-two is still “young”, but it is the beginning of “real world” interactions and the lifting of veils that shrouded you from how hard life gets. School is gone; replaced by job or job searches, personal bills, more serious relationships, and a gnawing feeling that you need to “start” your dreams before you get “old”. I bring up this premise because it is all you hear in tracks, “Crisis Fest”, “I Was A Fool”, and “Sinking Sands”. Even Sunflower Bean’s titles allude to a sick feeling of being duped by life. You are working hard, you studied a lot, and you have enough heart to welcome love, but where are the payoffs? Lyrically, Sunflower Bean confront the foolery of believing life rewards you for playing according to social guidelines, and uses Julia Cumming’s voice to rip them.
Sunflower Bean – I Was a Fool
Now more than ever, cultural and political shifts are revealing that everything is constructed, which means that “social ladder” you thought you were going to climb is an illusion. This explains why songs such as, “Memoria”, “Burn It”, and “Anyway You Like” haze over you like a gentle hand removing the rose-colored glasses you did not know you were wearing. Their melodies show that guitar strings can strip off any social mask, which is why you want to applaud and mourn as you lose facades in “Human For” and “Puppet Strings”. Yet, Sunflower Bean need to make their rock cushiony and comfortable for Cummings satiny vocals.
Sunflower Bean – “Twentytwo” (Official Music Video)
If Sunflower Bean’s acoustic are a sofa for you to lay on and rest, then Cummings’ voice is the snug satin that covers them. She has a voice that is malleable in its capacity to cream over instrumentals like ice cream melting over a cone. Yes, their sound and lyrics hold her, but her voice also drapes over them to amp up that nothing truly confines you unless you play into its ideas of confinement. Being literally Twentytwo In Blue, in age, may not feel “freeing”, but this album can the beginning of your liberation through music. For More Information on Sunflower Bean And To Buy Twenty-Two In Blue Click Here.
Sunflower Bean – Crisis Fest
