Sunflower Bean
Mortal Primetime
LUCKY NUMBER
Has the shoegaze craze got you down? Try Sunflower Bean on for size. With a soft and fuzzy post-stoner-rock sound that can’t be resisted, the New York trio makes magic on their fourth record—and makes it sound oh-so-easy to pull it off. The yin to Ghost’s yang, Mortal Primetime is dropping the same day as the new record by the Swedish exhibitionists in the most unassuming way, sure to fly under the radar, and undeservedly so. Sunflower Bean started a little over a decade ago with lots of heart but a deficiency of direction and coherent sound—but with Mortal Primetime, they prove that they’ve ultimately grown into a band so unrecognizably superior that they may as well legally change their name.
It’s worth noting that the rough production quality of Sunflower Bean’s early material was evidently not of their own doing. Mortal Primetime is the first record they’ve produced by themselves, and it’s almost maddening that it took them this long to take those reins, because this record has a smooth, consistent, quietly confident sound quality to it that directly reflects what’s at the core of this band: elegance. There are no tricks at play here, because Sunflower Bean are good enough at songcraft that they don’t need to rely on any; simply by being themselves—a place that, admittedly, takes everyone a long time to arrive at in their own life—they shine through. That’s particularly the case on the fluid “There’s a Part I Can’t Get Back,” “Shooting Star,” and “I Knew Love.” Scratch that: It’s true on every damn song on this magnificent record.
“Oh no / It’s not the same / As when we used to play / Innocent games / Waiting for the rain,” guitarist/co-vocalist Nick Kivlen sings on the third track, “Waiting for the Rain,” before ripping into a Slash-style virtuoso guitar solo. The song is ostensibly about reconnecting with old friends and lamenting that times spent with them simply aren’t as fun as they used to be. But the delectably downcast song is so good, it actually makes a case against its own message: Soft rock like this never sounded so good in the AOR days of yore, when bands like Toto and Steely Dan led pop music down a dead end. Maybe they’re not even aware of it, but Sunflower Bean are on the right path, and hopefully blazing a trail that will be followed by young artists who spend more time looking up to the heavens instead of down at their navels.
