Sunset Rubdown : Random Spirit Lover

The woven lyrics and singular songwriting style heard in Sunset Rubdown invoke a mythological world, where magical narratives and tiny metaphors give shape to ordinary objects in the room; sometimes beautiful, sometimes beastly. The moniker was first born to bear the solo bedroom recordings of Spencer Krug, but has since evolved into a full-fledged band, involving the vital contributions of fellow Montreal residents Jordan Robson Cramer, Michael Doerksen, and Camilla Wynne Ingr. Now enter Sunset Rubdown's third full-length record, Random Spirit Lover, featuring twelve songs that bleed in and out of each other, mixing portents with theatrics, confusions with conversions. The dark glamour of the music beneath the half-baked revelations in rhyme creates a tone of high drama, blown-out and overt, but the stage is wild and the roles aren't clear, so the sincerity of the work and the spontaneity of the recordings can't help but shine through the formality of structure. In short, listening to Random Spirit Lover is like watching schoolchildren in a dress rehearsal for the annual Easter play. And though they aren't old enough to know the occasion is anything more than pastel-painted eggs and edible bunnies, they wear the fake beards with confidence and style.