Bad Weather California – Sunkissed
Never let your state of residency spoil your state of mind – advice Colorado’s perhaps incongruously named Bad Weather California have certainly taken to heart, turning in a lazy-days collection of summery psyche recordings that evoke beach-side imagery far from home on their new LP.
Quick to set the mood, “I’ll Reach Out My Hand” is awash with pedal steel, sunny hooks and a near calypso beat, fading out appropriately with Chris Adolf ‘s stoned vocal that here rolls somewhere between Dylan and Jagger. Keeping it vintage, “When You Smile” is later rife with handclaps and harmonies, building from humble beginnings into some electrified echo of The Velvet Underground ‘s classic “Sweet Jane”.
Immediately setting the eye-lids to half-mast, there’s also a smiling, Simian -esque lurch to “Let It Shine”, its camp call-and-response vocal and jaunty surf riffs included. “Stand In My Sunshine” brings a little mellow saxophone to Sunkissed ‘s horizontal vibe and “I’ll Sing Along” takes Delta Spirit ‘s barroom piano, along with a curiously unstable falsetto, straight down to the golden sands of the West coast. The livelier sax in the sun-bleached closer “You’re My Friend” comes squarely aimed at the dancefloor, jiving like a Beach Boys covers band having a decent stab at “Lust For Life”.
The minute-long blast of rockabilly “Skate Or Try” and the equally short punk-rocker “Freaks And Geeks” aside, Sunkissed is arguably one-dimensional stuff, but it’s such a pleasant dimension that only the most hard-hearted would try and deny it its (more than likely fleeting) moment in the sun.
Advised downloads: “I’ll Reach Out My Hand” and “You’re My Friend”.
~Sunkissed is out now on Family Tree .~
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