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Jul 02, 2013 Issue #46 - June/July 2013 - Charli XCX By Austin Trunick

The third album from Black Mountain members Amber Webber and Joshua Wells takes a stylistic turn, tossing their sparse psychedelia to the wind in favor of aloof synthpop. You could lose yourself in the absorbing, stark atmospheres of Infinite Light and its predecessor; these songs feel comparably sterile. Worse: The most distinctive, beautiful quality of Webber’s vocals—that trembling, vulnerable waver in her voice as she holds the longer notes—often disappears in this new style of song, lost in a wash of keys and electronic drums. “Moon,” with its gingerly-plucked acoustic guitar, and the haunting, strings-tinted ballad “Agatha” are the lovely exceptions here; there’s the old Lightning Dust we were missing for so much of the album. Experimenting with a change of direction for your third record is understandable, but drifting so far away from the qualities that made your sound so individual? That’s a little harder to forgive. (www.lightningdust.com)

Author rating: 5/10