Real Estate - Real Estate

Woodsist is gradually becoming a small label to watch. With releases like Crystal Stilt's self titled last year, and then nice surprises Woods and Ganglians earlier this year Woodsist has become synonymous with bands that don't have the greatest recording equipment but are able to add relevance to older genres. On November 17th, Woodsist will again release an album that keeps it refreshingly simple and familiar.

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Real Estate's self titled debut is an album that has proven itself able to melt my headaches and soothe tensions with it's slow and gentle nature. With a simple touch of the lo-fi haze, each song comes off as sparkling beach wave or soft sun kissed breeze. Singing mostly about summer days, loafing around, beaches and harbors, this release may have arrived a little late. Fortunately the tone of the music, being rooted in older classic song structure aided by the lo-fi sound, manages to make this album seem more of a vehicle for remembering fondly the days of summer, than being the soundtrack for an evening out at the beach.

Opener "Beach Comber," is a sombre yet sunny number with its light guitar string plucking against lyrics, "What you want is just outside your reach, you keep on searchin’ / You’re walking down that Pensacola beach, you keep repeatin’ / While you’re waiting for that sound, apparatus to the ground / You’re stealing from the lost and found / But what you find, ain’t what you had in mind." Though it's a light easily digestible pop song, the lyrics here create something that contextualizes the small concerns first world youth have in general; Though basically carefree, the songs on this album are also pensive and concerned.

Follow-up "Pool Swimmers" is equally light and dreamy with a the weightless problem of finding a new place to swim. A personal favorite, "Suburban Dogs" creates the romanticism of a meandering and pleasant existence in the suburbs (or wherever you may live freely) and a sense of home: "Suburban Dogs bark at slow moving trains / They'll run from your house and come back the same day / Suburban dogs are in love with their jeans / Carry me back to sweet Jersey /Back where I long to be."

I really enjoy this album more than I think I would normally a nice pop release for it's sentimental dealing with the past, as "Fake Blues" goes, "Well it's not as if I choose to be sad with these fake blues / But I gotta find a reason to write this song / And I won't be here for long." By the end of the album, past the long (perhaps tiring?) 2 instrumental tracks, it would seem Real Estate decide to visit the present in "Snow Days" and reach conclusion on a note of contentment "All you needed to know, you knew when you were free" followed by the gentle ooohs that seem to support the floaty nature of each song they're in. Real Estate has the elements to perhaps be an album to come back to again and again during the next few months, if not for reflection and reminiscence, then for a nice warm pop song.