For those of us who first encountered Shout Out Louds as a rather timid young band on an episode of “The O.C.” nearly a decade ago, there’s a moment about 12 seconds into the band’s newest record, Optica, when you realize you’re listening to a band that’s grown up as much as you have. Gone is the timid, washed-out aesthetic of the early 2000s—in its place is a truly gorgeous new sound, with a confidence only matched by its sweeping production values. That being said, Optica stretches a bit too long, and its songwriting doesn’t always match up to the record’s sonic architecture, but for the most part this Stockholmare five-piece has created an attractive and enjoyable fourth record, one which might just be the band’s best work yet.
Let’s return to that twelfth second, when the beat of mid-tempo opener “Sugar” drops and reveals its arpeggiating guitar refrain. It sounds like absolute sunshine, and as the song progresses to its inclusion of strings and horns, you’ll know that you’ve stumbled upon a band with an innate knack for details (though the year and a half spent in the studio probably also helped). Whether it’s effected steel drum sounds at the end of “Circles,” the lilting pan flute in the chorus of “Walking in Your Footsteps” or the synth-vocal loop in the brooding “Hermila,” Optica is filled with charming little musical flourishes that make the record a more eclectic listening experience than the band’s traditional foundation of guitar, bass and drums would initially suggest.
Take the sum of all these moments, and Shout Out Louds does a fantastic job of adding a modern angle to Optica’s well-defined 1980s vibe. For you moviegoers, it’s like John Hughes meets Wes Anderson, and as you same film buffs would know, that is a very, very good thing. Love, longing and loss appear frequently within singer Adam Olenius’ lyrics, and before long, he’ll have you yearning for that same elusive elsewhere.
The drawback of this reliance on tone (whether intentional or otherwise), however, is that it requires something truly memorable to break through the mood’s mould. Fourth track “14th of July” exemplifies this, with its driving drums, propulsive guitars and memorable chorus that together almost sound like something Friendly Fires would have trotted out a few years ago. “Illusions,” a straightforward love song which features a gorgeous female vocal refrain, also has the sweetest line on here: “A heart is what a heart is / It won’t forget where it came from / And when I walk down the line / I’m walking with you.” It’s equal parts timeless and shameless, and by the end of it, you won’t help but be swept up by its earnest lyrics and gorgeous production.
The problem is, “memorable” can go both ways. The seven-minute album centerpiece “Glasgow,” despite having some of the strongest instrumentals on the record, also features a monotonous vocal performance (does “If you know what I mean” really merit repetition?), and after its minute-long build never really goes anywhere, aside from a “what were they thinking?” semi-hidden synth jam that comes out of nowhere late in the track. Closer “Destroy” is similarly problematic, and for a record that’s a bit too long, it’s unfortunate that the album’s two longest tracks are also its two weakest.
As a result, it seems that the group’s frequent critics, who often find fault with the band’s aversion to risk, may have it the wrong way around; Shout Out Louds might just be a band that does its best work under a self-imposed set of constraints, faltering only when it grasps beyond its limits. Optica, though never truly bold or dynamic, works well as a romantic and thoroughly pretty group of indie pop songs bolstered by strong production values. And while Shout Out Louds were never the world’s (or even Sweden’s) greatest band, with Optica, the group may finally be living up to its full potential.
