This Swedish band's premier album has the most beautiful, achy, and simultaneously catchy song known to music; with "Pleasure Songs," you're immediately sucked into the world of The Mary Onettes. When listening to "Pleasure Songs," grief, love, and beauty seem to reverberate in the deepest parts of your ear canals; however, while intensely alluring, this first song is not completely reflective of the rest on the album.
Brought together largely because of their shared love of '80s and '90s music, The Mary Onettes make songs wrought with deep vocals and peppy, last-generation electronics. It's easy to hear The Cure in the band's inspirational formulation, but there's also something very Interpol about Philip Ekstrom's voice, particularly in songs like "The Laughter," where the band takes a break from crashing guitars and belted vocals to quiet down enough to create a ballad. Distortion also plays its part in the fabric of the album, as in "Explosions" where the gentle melody is met with a whir of noise that makes it reminiscent of a tune by Jesus and Mary Chain. Still, while clearly inspired by musicians 20+ years removed, there's an immediacy to The Mary Onettes' music that renders them quite contemporary. The allure of yesteryear met with an element that feels critically and undeniably "Today" makes The Mary Onettes and their first full album truly relevant to our music scene.
-Kaitlin Johnson
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