After 12 years, Sweet Trip still has that blissful tones intact.
I’ve been hearing of Sweet Trip for quite some time now but I just didn’t have the time to listen to their albums that split between dream pop, shoegaze, and dabbles of electronics and IDM. So after they released this album after 12 years of inactivity, I made sure to visit their past works before going through this.
And after 12 years since YWNK, I will say that their sound still holds up quite a bit. It’s more of a mix between the glitchy IDM stutters of V:D:C and the Shoegaze bliss of YWNK, with some variance and detours here and there that spark some great moments. The bombastic cuts that sparkle through ‘Tiny Houses’, ‘At Last a Truth That is Real’ and ‘Polar Equals’, and the sweeter cuts like ‘Chapters’, ‘Snow Purple Treasures’, ‘The Weight of Comfort, This Rain is Comfort’, and ‘In Sound, We Found Each Other’ that worked out really well with the tranquil melodies and vocals.
And going ahead with their lyrics. This is probably their most straightforward when it comes to the theme surrounding the musings of love and romance painted with a lot of vivid imagery of nature that does feel like a similar tread towards their past albums. It’s not as conceptual as their past albums like in V:D:C or in YWNK, it’s more of the poetry just simply embracing love with its detail towards the natural landscape and beyond, and I think it works with this blissful production and especially with that album cover. Sure, it doesn’t go anywhere, but I think it works really well given the production and compositions that sift through a myriad of bliss.
I suppose my main nitpick here is that with some of the tried detours especially on the second half which leads to some underwhelming and underweight results like 'Randfelt' with its wonky electronic touches, The oddly brief cuts like ‘Walkers Beware! We Drive Into The Sun’ and ‘Zafire Melts the Heart in Modulation’. And as much as their sound still sounds pretty serene, it's Sweet Trip's comfort zone for better and for worse. Yes it is still pretty and engaging at spots, but it's starting to feel a bit safe and a little bit cluttered this time, especially with the constant switch-ups towards genres and instrumentation that they flirted with on their past albums.
But then again, their sound still sticks regardless, going on full bliss with great enough results even if it does start to feel clunky at spots. And for 12 years, they still have that blissful core, and I’m fine with that.
Favorite Tracks: Tiny Houses, At Last a Truth That is Real, Polar Equals, The Weight of Comfort, This Rain is Comfort, This Rain is You, In Sound, We Found Each Other, Chapters, Snow Purple Treasure Least Favorite Track: Randfilt