Amid the avalanche of best-of-the-year lists, you might have missed Thurston Moore’s Top 30 albums of 2021—likely because it was buried on the Tumblr of his old New York noise-scene compatriot, J.G. Thirlwell. As to be expected from such a seasoned underground archivist, Moore’s list is a cassette-heavy, Spotify-resistant assembly of veteran free-jazzers, experimental sound artists, radical rappers, and new-school avant-guitar contortionists. But in the top slot is an album that, in this context, practically qualifies as a pop record—and it’s one that Moore was so smitten with, he and his partner Eva Prinz just had to release it themselves on their Daydream Library Series imprint.
Where Moore has often used his various platforms to champion proudly inaccessible artists operating on the fringes of the fringe, the debut album from Seafoam Walls, XVI, is the sort of record that could easily appeal to anyone who likes their indie rock on the cerebral side, whether you came of age in the era of Thrill Jockeyed post-rock, chillwave, DeMarco-core, or alt-R&B. In a nod to bandleader Jayan Bertrand’s Haitian heritage, the Miami quartet self-classify their sound as “Caribbean jazzgaze,” a descriptor that might suggest something more visceral than what actually transpires on XVI. For the most part, Seafoam Walls’ songs present a serene swirl of enchantingly chill guitar lines, pitter-pattered drum programming, and Bertrand’s vaporous vocal melodies. But that seemingly relaxed vibe belies a restless creative and philosophical spirit that frequently pokes through the surface mist.
Seafoam Walls began in 2014 as a solo vehicle for Bertrand, who had previously combined Haitian music with indie guitar aesthetics in the more traditional, folk-oriented outfit Kazoots. His vision for Seafoam Walls had already come into focus with the 2016 release of “You Can’t Have Your Cake and Ego Too (Happy Birthday)”—a dose of self-help psychedelia that, half a decade later, receives a proper re-recording on XVI with bassist Joshua Ewers and beatmaking multi-instrumentalist Dion Kerr. This new version retains the original’s essential tension between isolation-tank tranquility and hyperactive rhythmic tics, however, Bertrand wisely ditches the original’s deep, gothic vocal delivery for a higher honeyed croon that adds a more empathetic dimension to his agitated lyrics. Dream pop is normally treated as a sanctuary of sound, a chorus-pedalled cocoon from your problems, but Seafoam Walls remind us that, in our daily lives, therapeutic escapism is an often unattainable luxury. Beneath the dewy guitar textures of “You Can’t Have Your Cake and Ego Too,” Bertrand sounds off on dysfunctional relationships and the inability to have open, honest conversations within them, before delivering a motivational mantra—“fuck her, fuck him, fuck them, fuck all our egos”—that renders the song a gossamer lullaby with a hardcore heart.
Even as Bertrand zooms out to lament America’s cycle of gun violence (“You Always Said”) and the deadening effects of 9-to-5 work culture (“Program”), it’s easy to imagine the songs on XVI as being just a Mark Ronson remix away from turning into Tame Impala-level bliss-pop hits. But the beauty of Seafoam Walls is that, even as their songs adhere to clearly defined melodic and rhythmic lines, Bertrand and co. constantly rearrange and overlay them in unpredictable patterns, making shape-shifting acid-funk odysseys like “A.I.” and “See” feel both intricately constructed and improvised on the spot. By the time we reach XVI’s euphoric, island-bound instrumental closer “Rushed Rain,” we’re a million miles from the dank NYC no-wave scene that first spurred Seafoam Walls’ No. 1 fan into action some 40 years ago. And yet, Bertrand and Moore are ultimately making music from the same place: their eyes closed, their bodies at one with their effects pedals, and their wandering spirits eager to visit all the unexpected places their beautiful noise will lead them.
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